Reality check

How to read this paper

If you are interested or involved in regulation and policy for immersive technologies:

• Read the ‘Executive summary’, ‘Introduction’ and ‘Conclusion’ for an overview of our key findings on the immersive technology landscape, the challenges surrounding them and the methodology of our research.
• Read ‘Trend 1: Niche adoption’ to understand how immersive technologies have been adopted and the challenges associated with it.
• Read ‘Trend 2: Specialised use cases in diverse industries’ to understand how immersive technologies are being used in different industries, and the regulatory bodies relevant to its impacts across sectors.
• Read ‘Trend 3: Increased integration with generative AI’ to understand how immersive technologies are being deployed alongside generative AI models and the challenges and risks of this trend.
• Read ‘Trend 4: Market dominance of big technology companies’ to understand how such companies are dominating the immersive technology landscape, and the challenges and risks associated with this.

If you are involved in sector-specific regulation and policy for immersive technologies:

• The ‘Executive summary’, ‘Introduction’ and ‘Conclusion’ provide an overview of our key findings on the immersive technology landscape, the challenges surrounding them and the methodology of our research.
• Read the ‘Vertical sector use cases’ subsection under ‘Trend 2: Specialised use cases in diverse industries’ to understand current uses of immersive technologies.

If you are involved in horizontal regulation (e.g. as an equality or education regulator):

• The ‘Executive summary’, ‘Introduction’ and ‘Conclusion’ provide an overview of our key findings on the immersive technology landscape, the challenges surrounding them and the methodology of our research.
• Read the ‘Horizontal regulation’ subsection under ‘Trend 2: Specialised use cases in diverse industries’ for an overview of horizontal regulation relevant to immersive technologies, and areas that may require specialised consideration through guidance.
• Read the ‘Horizontal sector use cases’ subsection under ‘Trend 2: Specialised use cases in diverse industries’ to understand how immersive technologies are being used in industries relevant to your area, and the current regulatory landscape for these uses.

• If relevant to your area, read ‘Trend 3: Increased integration with generative AI’ and ‘Trend 4: Market dominance of big technology companies’ to understand key developments and needs of regulators and policymakers related to these trends.

If you are a researcher who is interested in the immersive technology landscape:

• Read the ‘Executive summary’ for an overview of the key findings and report structure.
• Read the ‘Timeline of immersive technologies’ section to understand the history of immersive technologies.
• Read the introduction to ‘Trend 1: Niche adoption’ followed by the subsections ‘Lack of widespread consumer adoption’ and ‘Niche enterprise adoption’ for an overview of the extent to which immersive technology has been adopted today.
• Read the introduction to ‘Trend 2: Specialised use cases in diverse industries’ followed by the subsections ‘Key sectors’ and ‘Specialised functions’.
• Read ‘Trend 3: Increased integration with generative AI’ to get an overview of how immersive technologies are merging with generative AI, and the challenges and risks of this.
• Read ‘Trend 4: Market dominance of big technology companies’ to understand how such companies are steering the immersive technology landscape.
• Read ‘Methodology’ to understand how this study was conducted.

If you are an interested user of immersive technologies:

• The ‘Executive summary’ gives an overview of the key findings.
• Read the ‘Timeline of immersive technologies’ section to understand the history and likely future trajectories of immersive technologies.
• Read the ‘Conclusion’ to understand the open questions and challenges of immersive technologies.

Executive summary

Immersive technology is an umbrella term for interactive technologies such as virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), mixed reality (MR) and immersive virtual worlds (IVWs). These technologies promise to expand our sensory experiences of the digital world. They vary in their placement on the virtuality–reality spectrum depending on the degree of immersion they provide.[1]

Traditional digital interfaces, such as digital screens, function as maps of digital information that can be searched. In contrast, immersive technologies seek to transform a map into territory that users can explore and manipulate.

This paper provides a timeline of the development and adoption of immersive technologies, along with an overview of the current state of play of immersive technology products across different sectors and how they are governed.

We draw on evidence gathered through a literature review and 26 interviews with researchers, developers, investors and practitioners who are using, building and deploying different kinds of immersive technologies in the UK, Europe and the US. We also use a patent analysis conducted by The Patent Searcher, an external partner in this project, to inform our analysis by examining recent trends in immersive technology innovation. Analysing patent families over time and their assignees provides insights into sectoral innovation activity, commercial investment levels, technology evolution and competitive dynamics.

Products such as Meta’s Oculus and Microsoft’s HoloLens have been positioned as general-purpose technologies that will revolutionise how consumers engage with the internet. This vision brought these technologies to the forefront of public attention in 2022, following Facebook’s rebrand as Meta.

We find, however, that the adoption of immersive technologies today is most significantly characterised by niche use cases, rather than by widely adopted general-purpose use cases. These uses leverage specialised technical functions to augment particular tasks in distinct sectors.

Despite a decline in attention from regulators, venture capital investors, consumers and the media, alongside growing interest in new advances in generative AI, certain immersive technologies have continued to receive significant enterprise investment and have seen market size growth and improved capabilities reflected in specialised use cases.

Many of these use cases take place in high-impact industries, augment safety-critical tasks and overlap with vulnerable groups, such as children and people receiving mental health care. These factors create significant potential for risk. With these advancements come a host of new regulatory, policy and ethical questions that regulators and policymakers will need to consider.

Rather than treating immersive technologies as ‘general purpose’, to govern them effectively regulators and policymakers may need to look to specific use cases in specific sectors.

Our analysis finds several obstacles that hinder immersive technology products from reaching widespread adoption.

Our analysis reveals four thematic trends in the immersive technology product landscape:

• Trend 1: Niche adoption: Immersive technologies have not fulfilled expectations of broad-scale adoption and have not become a general-purpose technology, due to bottlenecks including a lack of public trust, a preference for incumbent technologies, technical limitations and financial inaccessibility.
• Trend 2: Specialised use cases in diverse industries: Adoption has taken place across a diverse range of industries for specialised use cases that pose unique risks. This drives a need for bespoke governance responses aided by collaboration between horizontal regulators, who can provide specialised consideration to immersive technologies in their guidance, and sector-specific regulators who can address factors related to the particular contexts of deployment.
• Trend 3: Increased integration with generative AI: The integration of AI in immersive technologies has been longstanding in the field, but generative AI has been increasingly integrated in immersive technologies for synthetic content generation and user interaction management. This spurs the need for relevant regulators to revisit or provide new guidance to address any risks that may be exacerbated by these integrations, as well as any new risks that arise from them.
• Trend 4: Market dominance of big technology companies: The immersive technology product market is dominated by a handful of key players. There are concerns about anti-competitive market practices and the concentration of biometric data driven by the ‘loss leader’ data business models of big technology companies, as well as their disproportionate influence over the development of the market. There is a need for regulatory intervention to safeguard competition and ensure appropriate privacy and data collection protections.

These trends highlight several important considerations for regulators and policymakers:

• Bottlenecks to adoption currently limit the impact of immersive technologies, but these may change in the future. Regulators may want to monitor developments relating to the bottlenecks illustrated in this report, in order to continually evaluate the feasibility of immersive technologies reaching wider adoption levels – which would amplify the impact of any unmanaged risks – and develop pre-emptive governance approaches.
• Specialised adoption in diverse industries requires bespoke governance responses. To address existing risks, regulators may want to target specialised use cases of immersive technologies, as this is how immersive technologies are most commonly deployed today. These use cases are not general purpose but instead leverage particular technical functions to augment selected tasks in distinct sectors.
• Horizontal regulation alone may not provide enough detail to address the nuances of specialised cases. Updating horizontal guidance to provide particular consideration to immersive technologies may be necessary, alongside engagement and guidance from sector-specific regulators, to address particular use cases. Sector-specific regulators are best positioned to consider factors such as the context of deployment and the circumstances of the people impacted by a particular use case within their remit. This report lists relevant regulators and the use cases that fall within their remit, alongside descriptions of potential impacts. It also provides insight into each regulator’s state of play in relation to immersive technologies.
• The integration of generative AI for managing user interactions and developing immersive content raises particular concerns. Existing guidance may need to be revisited and additional guidance may be required to ensure that these concerns are addressed.
• Market dynamics within the immersive technology landscape enable big technology companies to establish the direction of product development, raising risks to competition and privacy. Competition and privacy regulators will need to observe and address this trend, while government departments seeking to support national innovation and growth may consider broadening their scope to ensure support for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

This paper is the second publication from the Ada Lovelace Institute project ‘Return to reality: An exploration of immersive technologies’. For an overview of the technologies discussed in this paper, read our explainer What are immersive technologies?[21] A forthcoming publication will explore the benefits and risks that can arise from the deployment of immersive technologies and present key recommendations for regulators and policymakers.

Introduction

Companies developing immersive technologies such as augmented reality (AR), mixed reality (MR), virtual reality (VR) and immersive virtual worlds (IVWs) have marketed them as general-purpose technologies that will ‘revolutionise’ how we work, learn, socialise and entertain ourselves.^[22] Meta and Apple have bet big on these technologies becoming more sophisticated, affordable and ubiquitous. In a blog post from 2023, Meta stated: ‘From trade industries to the fine arts and from entrepreneurs to the enterprise, immersive technologies are poised to revolutionise the way we work, play, and engage with the world around us.’^[23]

In this context, general-purpose technology refers to technologies that are multifunctional and have the potential to have a long-standing impact on society through multi-sector integration. Popular examples of technologies that are referred to as general-purpose technologies range from the internet to the steam engine.[24]

While big technology companies and media commentators have predicted that the broad-scale adoption of immersive technologies is just around the corner,^[25] it has yet to arrive. AR, MR, VR and IVW products have remained relatively niche technologies.

Against the backdrop of the mass release of AI foundation models and generative AI products such as OpenAI’s GPT-4^[26] in 2022, the immersive technology market seems to have slowed down, particularly for VR.

For example, the number of average monthly downloads of the Meta Quest app has been declining since 2021.^[27] This is also reflected in the sale of headsets, with Meta Quest sales down by 16 per cent in November 2024 compared with 2023.^[28]

Despite this relative waning of consumer interest, as seen in headlines such as ‘The Death of the Metaverse’,^[29] immersive technologies have continued to be developed and integrated into business and consumer contexts. While venture capital interest has also waned, big technology companies are still investing a significant amount of funding and interest in further developing immersive technology products. And while broad-scale adoption may not yet have happened, millions of people worldwide are nonetheless estimated to use immersive technologies like the Meta Quest headset .^[30]

These technologies are also being adopted for a wide range of specialised use cases, such as immersive performance and evaluation in education and training contexts, information overlay in military and policing, and immersive visualisation in product manufacturing and design.

The risks brought about by these use cases depend on the task being augmented, the technical function being leveraged, the sector of deployment, and the circumstances of people who are affected by them.

Providing a regulatory framework that addresses these risks in context therefore requires engagement from not only horizontal regulators with a clear digital remit but also regulators responsible for sectors where immersive technologies are deployed.

This paper first explores the timeline of the development and adoption of immersive technologies, then gives insight into the current state of play of immersive technology products.

We explore four current trends and their corresponding risk factors and relevance to regulators and policymakers: niche adoption; specialised use cases in diverse industries; increased integration with generative AI; and the market dominance of big technology companies.

Timeline of immersive technologies

Wave 1: Conception and invention of foundational technologies

1960s

AR	MR	VR	IVWs
1961: Morton Heilig patents Sensorama (first AR headset).	No significant developments.	1968: First VR headset prototype (Sword of Damocles Headset).	No significant developments.

1970s

AR	MR	VR	IVWs
No significant developments.	No significant developments.	McDonnell Douglas Corporation integrates VR into its head-Mounted display to create the VITAL helmet for military simulation.[31]	1975: Krueger’s VIDEOPLACE, the first interactive VR platform, displayed at Milwaukee Art Center.[32] 1977: Aspen Movie Map created by MIT, allowing users to wander through Aspen City.[33]

1980s

AR	MR	VR	IVWs
1986: IBM internally presents ‘smart’ flat panel displays for AR (now used in mobile apps such as Pokémon Go).[34]	No significant developments.	1982: Sayre Gloves – first Gloves meant to detect hand movements for VR. 1984: VPL (Virtual Programming Languages) Research founded. 1986: Super Cockpit, VR military simulator, formally released to the public. 1989: NASA produces Project VIEW, VR simulator for astronaut training.[35]	No significant developments.

Wave 2: Advancement/first commercialisation of immersive technologies

1990s

AR	MR	VR	IVWs
1992: Virtual Fixtures developed, one of first functioning AR systems to augment human perception. 1999: US Naval Research Laboratory begins research programme for Battlefield Augmented Reality System.	No significant developments.	1991: Virtuality Group VR arcade machines, allowing users to play with each other in real time through VR headsets. (This development also relates to IVWs.) 1991: NASA announces Mars rover VR driving system. 1995: Nintendo launches Virtual Boy console. 1997: Georgia Tech and Emory University launch VR programme for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in veterans (Virtual Vietnam).	1992: CAVE (Cave Automatic Virtual Environment) invented. (This development also relates to VR.)

2000s

AR	MR	VR	IVWs
No significant developments	2008: First commercial AR application: magazine advert of a model BMW Mini	2006: Nintendo Wii launches with early motion trackers/sensors.	2003: Release of Second Life.

Wave 3: Mass commercialisation of immersive technologies

2010s

AR	MR	VR	IVWs
2016: Release of Pokémon Go. 2018: Magic Leap One launched in the US.[36]	2016: Release of Microsoft HoloLens. 2018: Release of Magic Leap One. 2015: PicoXR founded.	2012: Oculus Rift Kickstarter launched.[37] 2013: Oculus Rift DK1 headset developer kit released. 2014: Facebook acquires Oculus. 2014: Google Cardboard released. 2016: Consumer release of Oculus Rift CV1. 2016: Release of HTC Vive. 2016: Sony releases Playstation VR. 2017: BBC launches VR Hub. 2018: Release of Oculus Go.	2014: VRChat released. 2015: AltspaceVR released.

2020s

AR	MR	VR	IVWs
No significant developments.	2024: Release of Apple Vision Pro.	2020: Samsung ends support for VR applications. 2021: ByteDance acquires Pico. 2022: China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) launches VR and industry application integration development Plan.[38] 2023: China’s MIIT releases three-year action plan for metaverse industry development.[39]	2021: Facebook rebrands to Meta. 2021: Horizon Worlds released.

Immersive technologies may appear to be a recent development, but in fact these technologies have been around for decades.^[40] There have been cycles of hype and investment alongside periods of low interest and development – this trend was noted by some of the experts working with immersive technologies who were interviewed for this project,^[41] and the trend was also confirmed by the project’s literature review.^[42]

One way to understand the historical trajectory of immersive technologies is to separate it into three major waves.^[43] According to one interviewee, the first wave of immersive technologies was in the 1960s. Examples include the ‘Sword of Damocles’, a stereoscopic display with motion sensors that was so heavy it had to be suspended from the ceiling. This was followed by a second wave in the 1990s. We are currently in the third wave, which started in the 2010s.^[44]

These waves have been driven by various forces. There have undoubtedly been substantial technical advances, such as the increasing capacity of digital sensors and screen resolution.^[45] For example, Nintendo’s Virtual Boy, released in 1995,^[46] had a display with a resolution of 384 x 224 pixels. The display resolution of Apple’s Vision Pro, released in February 2024, is 3800 x 3000 pixels.^[47] These technical advancements contribute to immersiveness by providing greater image quality, thus increasing the realism of the experience.

However, development has also been shaped by social and cultural movements. Below is a brief history based on the key trends discussed by interviewees. While the timeline above includes non-Western developments, this summary predominantly focuses on the development of the technology in the US and other Western countries, due to the composition of interviewees.

First wave (1960–90)

Early interest in AR started in the 1960s with Morton Heilig’s patent of the Sensorama Simulator, a device with a head-mounted binocular display, stereophonic speakers and mechanisms to release odours in order to ‘stimulate the senses of an individual to simulate an actual experience realistically’.^[48] Its proposed purpose was to train people who performed dangerous tasks (such as in military contexts) while reducing risks. This remains a popular use case for VR.

By the end of the decade, a team led by Ivan Sutherland had created the first VR head-mounted display system.^[49] One interviewee described this as the ‘first year with VR machines coming to the surface’.^[50] Another interviewee noted that even in the 1980s, there were claims that broad adoption of immersive technologies was ‘just around the corner’.^[51] Rather than there being a few dominant developers at the time, one interviewee highlighted that it was smaller companies ‘making the breakout hits’.^[52]

Second wave (1990–2010)

The second wave of immersive technologies emerged in the 1990s with a peak of hype.^[53] Neal Stephenson’s science fiction novel Snow Crash, in which he coined the term ‘metaverse’,^[54] reflected the growing interest in VR and inspired developers to make immersive-world technologies.^[55]

Improvements in hardware and software meant more cutting-edge products were becoming available. This includes products released following the development of Sega’s VR-1, such as Nintendo’s Virtual Boy and Forte’s VFX1.^[56]

There was a niche high-end market for immersive technology hardware for simulation and training. This varied from ‘data gloves’ to ‘position trackers’ and ‘exo-skeletons’.^[57] One interviewee pointed out that much of this hardware was too expensive for the average user, with headsets costing tens of thousands of pounds.^[58]

However, other relatively more affordable hardware devices for gaming were key to technical improvements in immersive technologies. For example, the 2006 release of Nintendo Wii, with its early motion tracking and motion sensors,^[59] was described by an interviewee as ‘an irreplaceable or indispensable technology for immersive technology’.^[60]

In terms of software, in 2003, Second Life was released, a multiplayer virtual world accessed through desktop and laptop computers. Users could interact with this virtual world and other users through avatars. One interviewee claimed that Second Life was ‘the very first experience that could be described as the entrance point to the metaverse’.^[61] This could be attributed to its use of real-time-rendered 3D graphics, its lack of preset gameplay objectives and its internet-based nature, allowing users to interact with each other in real time.^[62]

In this second wave, Cave Automatic Virtual Environment (CAVE) systems also began to make a public appearance, notably at the 1992 SIGGRAPH conference, where the original CAVE, developed by Thomas Defanti and Daniel Sandin, was presented. Rather than relying on a headset, these systems placed the user in a closed environment surrounded by screens.^[63] The original CAVE consisted of a 3m cubed room, where the floor, walls and even ceilings were made of computer-projected screens,^[64] illustrating the variety of immersive devices beyond headsets that existed at the time.

Third wave (2010–present)

The third wave of interest in immersive technologies was described by one interviewee as ‘the age of the head-mounted displays’.^[65] Several interviewees discussed the launch of the Oculus Rift Kickstarter funding campaign in 2012^[66] as the beginning of this wave.^[67]

Some interviewees highlighted that the original Oculus Rift was intended not as a consumer product^[68] but as a ‘development kit’, with developers encouraged to engage with, and develop games for, the system. It was therefore priced more accessibly.^[69] The high level of interest led to plans being scaled up. Oculus received venture capital funding, and the first headset, Oculus Rift DK1, was released in 2013.^[70] Participants noted that the release of this headset led to growing interest among investors and consumers alike, despite early products being more like prototypes, according to one interviewee.^[71]

In March 2014, Facebook announced that it was acquiring Oculus for $2 billion.^[72] This was seen as an opportunity for the immersive technology ecosystem to expand beyond a niche gaming market. Interviewees^[73] described the excitement surrounding the acquisition: ‘You have [Facebook] coming on board and saying “Hey, we believe in this technology” and I think it really pushed it into a different conversation. That’s the modern start of the timeline.’^[74]

Some interviewees noted that Facebook’s acquisition also cemented its ability to build both hardware and software for immersive technologies.^[75] The release of Oculus Rift CV1, Facebook’s first VR headset, in 2016^[76] was an important step for the company, especially since ‘that was the first consumer product they’d ever done’.^[77]

One interviewee emphasised the importance of controlling hardware and software for Facebook’s business model: ‘If [Facebook] is just making the apps, [they] lose and if [Facebook] is just making the hardware [they] lose – [they] have to make both to compete. Otherwise, [they] still will be stuck behind Apple and Google as the people that control this marketplace.’^[78]

Participants discussed how in these early stages of the wave, ‘there was a huge explosion of different start-ups and companies’, with many attending the Silicon Valley Virtual Reality Conference in May 2014.^[79] This set the stage for the media, investors and the general public to pay increased attention to immersive technologies, spurred on by technical developments.^[80]

As one interviewee described it, ‘The last decade is the modern resurgence of consumer [immersive technologies]. It has been marked by having access to both gyroscopes and all the technologies that have been embedded within mobile phones. But also, mobile screens that have enabled the proliferation of low-cost consumer-grade virtual and AR technologies […] So there’s been a whole ecosystem kickstarted by having the capability to basically create these different immersive experiences.’^[81]

During this time, other companies such as Microsoft, Magic Leap and HTC also announced and released AR/VR headset products.^[82] ‘You had all these companies working in parallel to develop more user-friendly headsets for true virtual reality.’^[83] Several immersive technology products were released in the years following 2014, including headsets such as Microsoft HoloLens, HTC Vive, Oculus Rift CV1, Oculus Go, Magic Leap One and Sony’s Playstation VR.

The release of Pokémon Go in 2016 was a significant event in gaining attention for AR: ‘That year … was a huge boost for that technology where it really became sort of a household name.’^[84]

One interviewee highlighted technical advances in this period that helped to improve immersive technologies. These included improvements in tracking technologies, demonstrated by products such as the HTC Vive, released in 2016. Earlier forms of VR had basic capabilities for tracking a user’s body and translating their movements into a virtual environment.^[85] These new products introduced ‘room-scale’ VR, allowing the user to more freely move around a virtual environment by installing external sensors in the room where a VR headset was used.

This was followed by further improvements in tracking in the next generation of headsets in 2018, where tracking could be done on headsets rather than relying on external tracking devices.^[86]

This period also saw the release of the HTC Vive Pro in 2018. This marked the beginning of headsets using pass-through features, where cameras on the front of the device record the physical environment and display it in real time in the headset so that the screen appears transparent, making MR more feasible.^[87]

This trend was followed by Oculus Quest (released in 2019) and Meta Vision Quest 2 (released in 2020). Through these MR headsets, users interact with the physical environment but also move across levels of immersion by switching into VR environments using the same device.[88] Many in the field of human–computer interaction celebrated these innovations due to their heightened immersion compared with AR[89] and a reduced sense of isolation compared with VR technologies.[90]

Brands aimed to capitalise on public interest and excitement around immersive technologies and VR from 2016 to 2018, by creating personalised experiences to market products, such as virtual showrooms.^[91] As one interviewee described, ‘everyone wanted to be seen using it, there was a lot of investment and a lot of brands making stuff in this area’.^[92]

There was also interest from public sector organisations. In the UK, the BBC launched a VR Hub for commissioning content for headsets.^[93] In the US, Microsoft announced a contract with the US army for a prototype of a version of the HoloLens headset for military use.^[94]

Some of these initiatives were short lived or initially experienced setbacks. The BBC’s VR Hub lasted only two years; it ceased production in 2019^[95] due to lack of viewer adoption, according to one interviewee.^[96] Initial leaked reports on the military version of the HoloLens IVAS (Integrated Visual Augmentation System) headset suggested that it was causing nausea and eye strain.^[97]

Development is ongoing, with recent reports that the defence start-up Anduril, co-founded by Palmer Luckey, founder of Oculus, is now involved.^[98] Despite Microsoft announcing in October 2024 that the HoloLens 2 headset was being discontinued, the company remains committed to the HoloLens IVAS.^[99] Headset developers have expressed concern about user retention rates.^[100]

Interviewees disagreed about whether 2020 was a lull or boost for immersive technologies. Some interviewees emphasised that lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic led to an increase in the use of immersive technologies, especially among younger people.^[101]

Others^[102] suggested there was not as much commercial activity during the period, and noted the failure of immersive technologies to take off despite ‘the perfect moment for immersive technology [being] lockdown’.^[103]

However, VR and AR headset sales have risen rapidly during the pandemic, with some sources reporting increases of up to 50 per cent globally from 2019 to 2020.^[104] Electronic and technology retailers also reported sales increases, such as Curry’s PC World, which reported VR headset sales increases of 350 per cent in one year in the UK.^[105]

Several interviewees mentioned Facebook’s rebrand to Meta in 2021 as a point of increased investment and interest in IVWs and immersive technologies more generally.^[106] Some saw it as a vote of confidence in the technology:

‘The transition from Facebook to Meta … was obviously a huge endorsement from the company that … this is where the company is intending to grow in the coming years and decades.’.^[107]

This viewpoint aligns with Meta’s long-standing vision of immersive technologies fundamentally changing the way we interact with the world and each other.^[108] But another interviewee noted that there could be other reasons for the change: ‘I think [Facebook], especially after the election, had just a terrible brand name and that’s why they had to rebrand themselves.’^[109]

Several interviewees mentioned that the public interest in immersive technologies had died down again since the increase in hype following Facebook’s rebrand.^[110] The media has made similar claims, with headlines often proclaiming the decline or ‘death’ of immersive technology products such as the metaverse, PlayStation VR2 and other once-hyped platforms.^[111]

However, some interviewees said that they had continued to see growth and adoption of headsets, especially given Apple’s entry to the market with the Apple Vision Pro.^[112] But the Apple Vision Pro’s sales were stunted by its high price tag and limited software compatibility. Although it was seen by interviewees as a large step forward for immersive technologies, there have been rumours of halted production in light of diminishing sales.^[113]

In the UK context, low investor appetite to support immersive technology start-ups is partly evidenced by the fall in the number of active companies since 2022 and a 50 per cent decrease in investment rounds in the immersive technology sector since the same year.[114]

This is supported by global investment reports, which show that funding rounds for start-ups related to AR/VR and IVWs dropped by over 90 per cent, and total start-up funding fell by more than half between 2022 and 2023.^[115]

Enterprise disinterest has been particularly noticeable for IVWs, with 2023 sector redundancies including 30 per cent of VRChat’s staff, Mozilla shutting down its Hubs virtual reality platform, Microsoft shutting down AltspaceVR,^[116] and Meta laying off its metaverse division.^[117]

However, more recently, investment in AR-related ventures has picked up, marked by actions such as Meta’s $100 billion investment aimed mostly towards AR products in its Reality Labs Division^[118] and Xreal’s planned investment of $138 billion for AR glasses.^[119]

There have also been recent product releases focusing on AR, including Meta’s Ray-Ban AR glasses,^[120] Orion glasses,^[121] XReal’s One glasses^[122] and rumours of forthcoming Apple AR glasses.^[123] Companies have also continued to invest in MR products, with yearly releases of new headsets such as Meta’s Quest 3, Apple’s Vision Pro, Pico’s 4 Ultra and HTC’s Vive XR Elite.

There is also a growing trend in enterprise investment toward implementing AI in AR technologies, such as devices that combine AI assistants with overlay functionalities. Examples include the Meta Ray-Ban glasses and Halliday Glasses, which raised more than £2 million on Indiegogo There are also more advanced projects such as Meta’s Orion glasses and Project Aria, which incorporate both AI and spatial computing.

Some of these products, such as the Meta Ray-Ban glasses, solely provide audio overlay, allowing users to interact with the AI model in the context of their environment. For example, by asking it questions about their surroundings. As such, they still fall within the definition of AR set out in the Ada Lovelace Institute’s explainer What are immersive technologies?[124]

Moreover, recent reports suggest that the Meta Ray-Ban glasses will integrate visual overlay in their next version.^[125] These product releases have been supported through continuous investment in AI infrastructure, such as Meta’s recent investment of $60 billion in its AI division. Product releases have also been supported by industry partnerships between wearable technology producers and AI companies, such as Snap, and Brilliant Labs’ partnerships with Perplexity and OpenAI.^[126]

Perceived future trajectories

When discussing the landscape and timeline of immersive technology products, interviewees touched on how they envision these technologies might develop in the future. Many interviewees saw immersive technologies as a nascent industry^[127] heading in the direction of greater adoption.^[128]

Interviewees foresaw greater adoption taking place in a variety of ways. Some discussed the future of immersive technologies as one where broad-scale adoption is achieved^[129] and immersive technologies are the standard medium for interacting with the internet. One interviewee described this ‘immersive internet’^[130] as the next stage in internet and computing, aligning this forecast with the aims of some developers, who, as described by another interviewee, are striving for the ‘next phase of social media or even the internet more broadly’.^[131]

In this context, broad-scale adoption refers to the widespread integration of technology in society to a point where it becomes self-sustaining, with consumer adoption continuing without reliance on external promotion and marketing. For broad-scale adoption to occur, the technology must move beyond niche adoption and be widely utilised within the target market, not just by early adopters.

For example, while automated teller machines (ATMs) were initially exclusively deployed by Barclays in the UK, they have since been adopted all over the world. Broad-scale adoption also requires market penetration across demographic groups. This can only be achieved through product accessibility, cost-effectiveness and distinct value.[132]

For example, ATMs provide widespread access to banking services across different demographics by offering convenient, 24/7 cash withdrawals and basic financial transactions at a low cost all over the world.

Some interviewees anticipated that current technological advances of current trends such as improvements in AI smart glasses and in pass-through MR displays will support the achievement of broad-scale adoption by enabling immersive products to be significantly integrated into everyday tasks.^[133]

They described how developments in MR, for example, may enable applications to ‘move across the gradient of immersion’ and allow users not only to view their physical environments through pass-through technology but switch between interacting in the physical and virtual worlds through a single product.^[134]

Some interviewees foresaw MR developments in particular as being integrated into smart glasses, leveraging the benefits of MR and AI assistants alongside the lightness^[135] of glasses in a way that would be easier to use for daily tasks.^[136]

While many companies invested in immersive technologies share the perspective that the technologies will be integrated into peoples’ daily lives, Meta stands out as a strong supporter, with constant references to the immersive technologies becoming a general-purpose technology.^[137]

General-purpose technology refers to technology which has multiple functions, is used for varied purposes and has the potential to have a long-standing impact on society through multi-sector integration. Common examples of earlier general-purpose technologies include electricity and information technology.[138] These technologies have not only seen cross-sector implementation but have also fundamentally changed the nature of both household life and business operations.

This contrasts with technologies such as barcode scanning, which serve a single, specific purpose, are primarily confined to sectors like retail and logistics, and lack the capacity for multi-sector integration.

Big technology companies which have been investing heavily in immersive technologies tend to present the future of these technologies as one where general-purpose and broad-scale adoption is achieved. For a technology to be regarded as general-purpose, it needs only the potential to influence society greatly and does not require this potential to be realised.

Broad-scale adoption does tend to be achieved by general-purpose technologies due to their mass appeal. For example, the smartphone offers several different use cases (messaging, calling, recording, taking photos, consuming media), contributing to its adoption across sectors.

However, broad-scale adoption of a technology does not require it to be general purpose. For instance, GPS technology, while globally adopted, has a narrow use case focused on location tracking and navigation.

Some interviewees contested this vision of general-purpose and broad-scale adoption, instead anticipating greater niche adoption. As illustrated by one interviewee: ‘It is probably gonna remain quite a niche technology and will evolve into the use cases [where] it is very good at doing [one] kind of thing, but it’s not a solution to everything. It’s not a replacement for the phone and stuff, which I think some of the hype in the past has tried to say.’^[139]

In line with this view, other interviewees anticipated that immersive products would move away from being social platforms^[140] and their deployment would increase across a range of use cases^[141] that were more targeted.^[142] For example, supporting productivity in workplace contexts^[143] or delivering more forms of interactive entertainment.^[144]

Though less prevalent, this view has also been echoed in industry, with immersive technology developers such as Magic Leap emphasising the role of specific use cases, such as for surgery, within the mass adoption of immersive technologies.^[145]

In terms of timelines, some interviewees anticipated broad-scale adoption to be ‘just around the corner’,^[146] while others stated that they did not think greater adoption would happen as soon as developers might like.^[147] Four interviewees discussed how there is currently no clear path to scaling immersive technologies.^[148]

Trend 1: Niche adoption

Through our interviews and research, we identified two distinct visions and perceived developments for immersive technologies. The first presents it as a general-purpose technology with multiple functions which has the potential to have a long-standing impact on society through multi-sector integration. The second vision predicts that it will become more specialised, with further niche adoption in distinct sectors. While some of our interviews suggested that immersive technologies might become general-purpose, the vast majority of evidence points to it being specialised.

The vision of general-purpose immersive technologies has been put forward by developers, including Meta. On 28 October 2021, the company stated: ‘The metaverse will eventually encompass work, entertainment, and everything in between’ and would be the ‘successor to the mobile internet.’[149]

In a blog post from 2023, Meta also stated that the metaverse would ‘revolutionise the way we work, play and engage with the world around us’.[150] Statements such as these emphasise an expected future where immersive technologies such as the metaverse are general-purpose technologies.

The second vision revolves around the development of products with specialised functions tailored for particular use cases in specific industries. This reflects the history of the immersive technology industry, with common applications including flight simulators, military training^[151] and medical uses.^[152]

The immersive technology marketplace in this vision would consist of products aimed at particular uses and types of consumers, such as VR devices meant for medical operations, classroom educational experiences or cognitive behavioural therapy.

Regulatory strategies for emerging technologies have so far prioritised immersive technologies based on whether they meet expectations of broad-scale adoption and multifunctional use. These expectations were set by developers. We find that these expectations have not yet been achieved.

Instead, while some of our interviews suggested that immersive technologies might be adopted for general purposes, the vast majority of evidence points to their use being more niche.

Interviewees noted that immersive technology products have not reached widespread adoption in the consumer market^[153] or broad integration across specific industries.^[154] Instead, they were described, by one interviewee, as technologies with ‘niche applications in a vast number of domains’,^[155] tending towards enterprise use.^[156]

In the subsections below, we further explore the niche adoption of immersive technologies. We discuss trends in the adoption of immersive technologies and outline a variety of bottlenecks to the broad-scale adoption of these technologies.

Regulators may benefit from monitoring the likelihood of immersive technologies being more widely adopted, to ensure that they can establish proportional governance mechanisms ahead of time.

Lack of widespread consumer adoption

Some interviewees described immersive technology products as being comparatively unknown to consumers, with relatively few people having bought and used headsets.^[157] For example, one interviewee described IVWS as ‘interesting and often powerful for a niche set of users, niche in the population’.^[158]

Consumer adoption levels for IVWs not meeting developers’ goals is reflected in Meta’s Horizon Worlds user count, which only reached half the number of projected users for 2022.[159]

Seven interviewees highlighted that the user base for commercial immersive technology products is small and specialised^[160] and one interviewee noted that this user base is growing slowly.^[161]

Interviewees described a hype cycle around immersive technologies. This increased consumer awareness and interest, particularly in headsets, but was not sustained and has since declined.^[162] Some participants suggested that even when consumers purchase immersive technology products, these products are not used regularly: ‘Relatives come around and have a go on VR and that’s the only time it gets used. It’s not used every day.’^[163]

This distinction between product purchases and day-to-day use may indicate that the technologies have not been integrated into everyday life even within the niche groups that have adopted them, which primarily consist of young adults.^[164]

Gaming and social media applications – which are popular consumer uses of immersive technologies^[165] – remain a niche way of interacting with these platforms, as described by one participant:

‘More entertainment time […] is happening in an immersive entertainment space such as Roblox and Fortnite, but not that much of that consumption is happening in an immersive headset or a device like a VR headset.’^[166]

Comparing immersive technology applications with social media, one participant discussed how immersive technologies have not been widely adopted for mediating social relationships, using romantic relationships as an example of an important market for technology companies: ‘In terms of it being an everyday tool for our sociality, our romance, which is what the companies are the most interested in because that promises scalability that promises deep integration, that [expectation] is overblown.’^[167]

Niche enterprise adoption

In contrast, interviewees discussed the comparatively greater adoption of immersive technology products in enterprise contexts,^[168] such as for VR meetings and data visualisations: ‘There’s the enterprise-level use of headsets, which have seen a massive surge the last few years. Companies adopting VR, XR training applications in headsets, and that’s driven some of the tech forward.’^[169]

This view is supported by the academic literature, which suggests the adoption of immersive technologies by companies such as Volvo, Boeing and Walmart has supported technological development.^[170] Some interviewees described increased investment in developing enterprise products as a way for developers to adapt to the low uptake of consumer products,^[171] noting that businesses are more able than individuals to purchase products due to their greater financial resources.^[172]

However, the use of immersive technologies, even within industries that currently use them the most, remains niche. These technologies have not been adopted pervasively or become standard across any enterprise or consumer industry, and especially not within SMEs.^[173] One interviewee stated: ‘I don’t think [immersive technology has] become ubiquitous by any means.’^[174]

VR and MR design applications have seen comparatively high levels of adoption: interviewees mentioned use cases such as 3D design proving valuable for a variety of industries, including manufacturing, product development, art, industrial design and architecture. But the rate of adoption of these applications seems to be relatively slow.^[175]

Other comparatively popular enterprise applications, such as the use of MR and VR in educational contexts, follow a similar pattern, as described by one participant:

‘There’s obviously a lot of uptake in universities and education and those areas. But I think there’s a general consensus, even with like Apple coming into the market on the headset side, that this is probably going to remain quite a niche technology.’^[176]

Bottlenecks to broader adoption

Interviewees discussed a range of bottlenecks to broader adoption. As regulators and policymakers monitor the development of different emerging technologies, these bottlenecks may indicate the feasibility of immersive technologies becoming more widely adopted.

Considering these bottlenecks in horizon-scanning exercises, which some regulators are already undertaking specifically for immersive technologies,[177] can support in establishing pre-emptive strategies for addressing subsequent risks that may arise from broader adoption.

Lack of public understanding

Interviewees perceived a lack of public understanding about immersive technologies.^[178] They noted that there has not been a unified and simple message from developers,^[179] which has resulted in public confusion of immersive technology products with other technologies such as Web3, cryptocurrencies and blockchain.^[180]

This finding is also prevalent in the academic literature, where public understanding of immersive technologies is identified as a key boundary to wider adoption.^[181] This lack of unified messaging from developers is illustrated by one interviewee: ‘The fact that we can’t actually describe it right? […] Is it immersive, is it the metaverse? What is it?’^[182]

Lack of public trust and developer transparency

Interviewees described how members of the public have questions about the safety of immersive technology products: ‘Are you going to get nauseous? What’s your privacy settings? Do you know how to use your privacy settings? What about my kid using this?’^[183] This contributes to a lack of public trust in the products:^[184]

‘People do not trust these mainstream platforms. They don’t trust the data privacy. They don’t know where the data is going, like if it’s being kept or any of that.’^[185]

Interviewees discussed how this lack of trust is aggravated by a lack of transparency from developers,^[186] including around data collection and processing. This finding is mirrored in the academic literature, which finds that concerns over data privacy are a major roadblock to immersive technology adoption.^[187]

Preference for incumbent technologies

Interviewees noted that for people to change the way they do things by adopting a new technology, this technology has to offer significant value to them^[188] – a view that is, again, shared in the literature.^[189] They commented that immersive technologies are not offering enough added value to compel users to replace traditional technology with immersive technology applications.^[190]

Interviewees noted that the value these technologies offer is not very different from the value offered by technologies people currently use, which are easier to use and more accessible.

One interviewee, for example, discussed how the value offered by many VR applications is about connecting with other people – something that users can already do with an application such as WhatsApp:

‘The question is: what are these immersive tools like VR, AR, etc. offering that low data intensive tools don’t do?’^[191]

Some interviewees did state that immersive applications can offer additional value, but they did not believe that this value warranted the effort of adoption:

‘Film probably looks better to watch a 3D film in VR, but that’s not really enough for it to, like, replace a telly […] there’s that effort versus reward thing and I just don’t think it’s enough generally on the consumer side of things.’^[192]

Some interviewees mentioned that the public generally prefer traditional hardware,^[193] even as a means of accessing virtual worlds.^[194]

Limited and uncompelling applications

Some interviewees described how immersive technology products have not yet provided compelling enough value propositions to warrant broad-scale adoption:^[195]

‘We’re also still waiting for, like, the killer app. The thing that on the consumer side is going to be really compelling.’^[196]

The uses of these technologies were instead described as isolated, as ‘sort of games on your face’^[197] that give people extra things to do, rather than making existing life activities easier.^[198]

Examples of applications that were not seen as compelling included those that simulate day-to day interaction:

‘I don’t need to walk down a virtual supermarket store […] I think there was a lot of trying to replicate what already exists in an immersive space, but what already exists is much better than what they were replicating in a crappy, poorly rendered 3D virtual space.’^[199]

Interviewees gave some exceptions, such as design applications, but highlighted how compelling applications captured only around 10 per cent of what developers had hoped for in in the consumer market in the latest hype cycle.[200]

Challenges of integration into daily life

Interviewees discussed how broad-scale adoption was not achieved in the latest hype cycle because it was too much work to fit the technology into people’s lives.^[201] Again, this view is mirrored in the academic literature on uptake.^[202] Interviewees said that it was not easy to incorporate certain VR applications into the home because significant space is needed to be able to move around without knocking things over.^[203] This limitation is acknowledged in usability studies.^[204]

Interviewees also noted that integrating the technologies into people’s social contexts was difficult. One mentioned how using a headset to watch TV does not work when you want to watch TV with others: ‘What if my friend comes around and I haven’t got a [second] headset?’^[205]

Other interviewees mentioned that users may feel isolated by using headsets,^[206] particularly in social contexts where they may feel exposed and cannot see what people around them are doing.^[207] This feeling of isolation has been supported in several studies, notably in the case of virtual tourism experiences.^[208]

Technical limitations

The technical limitations of immersive technologies were frequently described by participants,^[209] with immersive products requiring technical improvements to support broad-scale adoption.

Interviewees said that VR/ISW platforms can be glitchy,^[210] have display issues^[211] and require a significant amount of computing power to render high-resolution content.^[212] Once more, these challenges have also been noted in the scientific literature.^[213] When discussing IVWs, one interviewee commented:

‘Most people have PCs, but I think until things like cloud streaming, which allows for kind of rendering locally … it’s not going to reach a completely ubiquitous audience.’^[214]

Unrealistic and overinflated expectations

The technical limitations in turn contributed to immersive technology products not meeting expectations set by developers’ marketing during the latest hype cycle: ‘I guess they were promising it with lots of pre-rendered videos […] that was a 10-year vision.’^[215] Interviewees noted that it can be challenging to convince people to use the technology again after an initial dissatisfying experience.^[216]

Hardware design

Interviewees described a variety of usability issues with the hardware used for immersive technology products, particularly headsets.[217] Although there have been improvements,^[218] participants commented that headsets are not comfortable,^[219] a problem also commonly discussed in the literature.^[220]

Problems include how headsets can ruin users’ make-up and hair,^[221] the weight of headsets,^[222] which can cause neck discomfort and physical strain,^[223] and the fact that they can be too warm.^[224]

Interviewees also described a lack of efficiency, noting that users find headsets big,^[225] bulky,^[226] clunky^[227] and, overall, inconvenient to use and transport compared with traditional hardware such as laptops, tablets or phones.^[228]

Friction

Interviewees also noted a lot of ‘friction’ (in the form of challenges and complications) in using headsets.^[229] For example, one interviewee stated that:

‘Even typing a password you know just takes ages. There’s still a lot of sort of pain points and friction.’^[230]

This was compared with the more seamless experience provided by traditional hardware:

‘It’s failing […] where the effort of using it [is not worth] the inconvenience of doing it. It is not inconvenient whatsoever to get an iPad out and look at something and show it to someone and get a pen out and draw, and it’s not inconvenient to take your laptop out and [it] works anywhere you want as long as you got WiFi.’^[231]

Interviewees also discussed the comparatively high level of digital literacy and skills^[232] required to use these products. One interviewee said: ‘You really need to be technologically informed and capable in order to play with these things more than other things like games.’^[233] This point is extensively supported in the academic literature.^[234]

Barriers to long-term use

Some of the technical issues identified in interviews impact products’ long-term usability. For example, having a small field of view^[235] and other display issues that cause eye strain^[236] and cyber-sickness,^[237] another problem commonly discussed in the literature.^[238]

Interviewees noted that these effects may not be experienced by all users and are felt by some more than others.^[239] This was a view shared in the literature^[240] but immersive technology hardware such as headsets was noted by numerous interviewees as not conducive to long periods of use in their current state.^[241]

Lack of accessibility

Interviewees discussed issues with accessibility, touching on how people with physical disabilities may not be able to effectively use immersive hardware without additional adaptive technologies.^[242] One interviewee described how they are not able to use standard headsets because they have a strong glasses prescription.^[243]

Interviewees also highlighted issues experienced by wheelchair users, who may similarly require adaptive technology that is not incorporated as part of standard immersive technology hardware.^[244] Other accessibility restrictions in immersive technologies have been extensively reported in the literature.^[245]

Digital barriers to access

Interviewees discussed ways in which immersive products were inaccessible due to their technical requirements, such as the need for significant computational processing power to enable high-quality rendering.^[246] Many applications also require large physical spaces, which could limit uptake with home users.^[247]

Financial barriers to access

Interviewees identified significant financial barriers to accessing immersive technology products.^[248] The products are expensive compared with incumbent products (i.e. established technologies that new innovations must compete against),^[249] which people are more likely to already own. For example, the Apple Vision Pro retails starting at £3,499.

Beyond the cost of purchase, additional costs for using immersive technology products contribute to this financial barrier, such as subscriptions for the software used to manage headsets within institutions.^[250]

Decline in investment

Interviewees discussed a variety of key areas where there is financial investment in immersive technologies such as AR,^[251] haptic technologies (devices that react to, detect or simulate touch for a user), military and policing applications,^[252] IVWs^[253] and healthcare.^[254]

At the same time, interviewees noted a relative decline in recent years in investment in MR and immersive technologies more generally.^[255] Some interviewees mentioned that this is in part due to funding that previously might have gone to immersive technologies being directed towards AI products:^[256] ‘Once AI hit … if you weren’t already in the work stream for VCs, you weren’t going to get any money.’^[257]

Both in the UK and in a global context, claims of low investor appetite are supported by venture capital data, including funding rounds and total start-up funding awarded. Both of these have dropped significantly since 2022, with funding rounds dropping by over 90 per cent from 2022 to 2023.^[258]

Trend 2: Specialised use cases in diverse industries

Immersive technologies are known to pose a number of risks and harms, and regulation is required in order to safely manage them. Designing appropriate governance will depend greatly on how the technology is adopted in practice.

As discussed in the previous section, immersive technologies have so far been regarded as general-purpose and that fall within existing regulatory strategies based on an expectation of broad-scale adoption. This has resulted in immersive technologies being deprioritised.

This has meant that immersive technologies are mostly addressed through horizontal regulation, such as privacy and data protection regulation, and equality law, which applies to all immersive technology use cases. However, horizontal regulation does not specifically consider these technologies.

While the bottlenecks to adoption illustrated above may have meant that broad-scale adoption of these technologies has not been achieved, our research suggests that immersive technologies have been adopted across a diverse range of industries for specific use cases, using a specialised function to augment a particular task.

Many of these use cases take place in high-impact industries, augment safety-critical tasks and are likely to impact vulnerable groups, such as children and people receiving mental health care.

While the scope of adoption of immersive technologies may indicate the number of people who may be impacted, scope is only one of several factors affecting impact. Contextual factors relating to the industries of deployment and the types of functions for which technologies are applied should also inform evaluations of potential risk. As illustrated by one interviewee:

‘There are high-risk contexts, there are low-risk contexts. It matters if I’m applying it [an immersive product] to entertainment or gaming versus if I’m applying it to warfare and healthcare.’[259]

Severity of potential harm, the level of impact of the sector in which a use case is deployed, the extent to which the task being augmented is safety-critical, and the vulnerabilities of people impacted may also be indicative of risk.[260]

The general-purpose approach to regulation, therefore, may not be well suited to addressing how the technology has been adopted in practice. Our research suggests that immersive technologies have been adopted across a diverse range of industries for specialised use cases, characterised by unique combinations of specialised functions leveraged in specific sectors to augment a particular task.

Figure 1: The components of an immersive technology use case

A use-case-specific approach to governance may therefore be needed – one that involves regulators that previously may not have engaged in this area addressing the unique risks posed by specialised use cases in distinct sectors.

Regulators may need to establish appropriate safeguards to ensure that existing use cases in the 11 sectors listed in the ‘Key sectors’ section below are safe. The risks in each specialised use case are informed by contextual factors, such as the particular task being augmented, the technical function being leveraged, the sector of deployment and the unique circumstances of the impacted people.

A person’s circumstances may increase their vulnerability to the impacts of a use case, such as the security of their work depending on their ability to use an immersive technology product.

Providing a regulatory framework that addresses use cases in a contextually aware manner therefore requires more active engagement from both horizontal regulators, with a clear digital remit who can provide specialised guidance, and regulators who are responsible for sectors where immersive technologies are commonly used.

So far, these regulators may not have considered immersive technologies as falling within their remit. But they can complement horizontal regulation, addressing factors related to the context of deployment and the unique circumstances of people who are impacted.

For example, the use of immersive simulation for augmenting the treatment of mental health conditions is subject to privacy and data protection law, as well as equality law (horizontal regulation). Because of its deployment by healthcare workers, it falls under the remit of employment regulators, and if it qualifies as a medical device, it must comply with standards set by the MHRA.

Figure 2: Laws and regulations that apply to immersive visualisation for mental health treatment

Horizontal regulation alone may not provide sufficient detail to address the nuances of how the specific use of information overlay may interact with and impact this specific sector and individuals in this context of deployment.

Sector‑ and group-specific regulators may complement horizontal regulators, providing intersecting regulation that is comprehensive and addresses nuanced risks with precision. This sector-specific approach is consistent with the UK government’s Pro-Innovation Approach to AI Regulation white paper.[261]

The subsection below explores horizontal regulation that is relevant to all immersive technology use cases. It also outlines key sectors in which immersive technologies have been adopted, and specialised technical functions leveraged to facilitate common immersive technology use cases.

To support sector-specific regulators in identifying which current use cases fall within their remit, we detail use cases that we have identified for each sector, highlighting the distinct tasks being augmented by each use case, the specialised functions being leveraged, and the particular sectors in which the use case is deployed.

We illustrate each use case with examples and descriptions of potential impacts. For each sector we provide insight into the regulatory state of play in relation to immersive technologies.

This will be complemented by an impact assessment report providing an in-depth evaluation of the impacts of immersive technologies – the forthcoming final publication from the the Ada Lovelace Institute project ‘Return to reality’.

Horizontal regulation

In this section, we explore horizontal regulation that is relevant to all immersive technology use cases, regardless of their sector of deployment. We highlight factors that may need to be addressed through guidance that gives specific consideration to immersive technologies.

Privacy and data protection regulation

As immersive technologies increasingly incorporate advanced biometric data processing, the challenges related to privacy and data protection become more intricate. As biometric data is most commonly personal data, regulations such as the GDPR^[262] and oversight by the ICO will increasingly need to explicitly address the complexities surrounding biometric data, particularly when it is used for profiling or emotional targeting.

Biometric data used for ‘classification’, such as inferring a data subject’s emotional states, does not currently enjoy the same legal protection as other forms of sensitive data, such as biometrics used for identifying a person.^[263]

As the biometric data being processed by immersive technologies does not fall within one of these ‘special categories’, it is much easier to use this data to personalise content and advertising to users based on their emotional states, including interactions with non-playable entities in IVWs, without seeking their consent.^[264]

Moreover, while the GDPR mandates a lawful processing basis (e.g. consent), data minimisation and transparency, its provisions may fall short in addressing the dynamic and often real-time processing of personal data in immersive technologies.^[265]

In many cases, IVW providers will seek to rely on consent for their processing, but the complexities of ensuring meaningful consent (and where required, explicit consent) become even more pronounced when this data is used for targeted advertising or decision-making interfaces. For example, adverts in IVWs may be personalised based on prior affective responses to other adverts.^[266]

Regulators face a significant challenge in balancing the development of features in immersive technology products with the protection of individual privacy and autonomy. For example, while more advanced motion sensors may allow users to navigate IVWs in a more realistic way, they will inevitably collect higher-fidelity user data. This in turn could be used to personalise the user’s experience in ways that may undermine their decision-making capabilities, This could be through, for example, hyper-personalised advertisements – a situation not yet sufficiently addressed by regulation or guidance.^[267]

This is especially the case for members of vulnerable groups who may be disproportionately impacted by invasive targeting in these evolving digital spaces. For example, cognitive impairments could be detected by tracking user movement and actions in IVWs,^[268] making some users more susceptible to invasive targeting. To prevent this, clearer safeguards are needed on profiling, consent, and the use of targeted marketing within immersive environments, which may also require involvement from the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) to address unfair advertising practices.

Other types of data that immersive technologies can collect that may not be covered by the GDPR include user interaction data, such as how individuals engage with immersive virtual environments, and ambient data, like room brightness or layout. These do not clearly fall within the scope of ‘personal data’ under the GDPR, but the collection of such data may nevertheless be invasive.^[269]

There is also a gap in guidance around whether specific kinds of biometric data collected by IVW deployers such as using head and body movements or behavioural patterns for high-risk profiling[270] constitute what makes someone identifiable[271] for the purposes of GDPR protections.

Equality law

Immersive technologies pose a range of inequality and discrimination risks which merit the attention of equality regulators. Factors related to financial and digital access, usability issues with the design of immersive hardware, problems with accessibility in immersive products, and the high level of friction required to use immersive products present particular challenges for certain groups. This contributes to disparate rates of adoption among different demographic and socioeconomic groups.

Interviewees discussed the high cost of immersive products compared with incumbent technologies, leading to their adoption mainly by a financially privileged user base and the exclusion of marginalised groups.^[272] This is echoed in the literature, which indicates the financial inaccessibility of immersive technology products.[273] This is the case for enterprise products,^[274] with disparate access in the educational and cultural sectors.^[275]

One interviewee stated that most schools do not have enough money to purchase such products;^[276] another said that adopters in higher education are a small group of the most socioeconomically advantaged.^[277] Interviewees also discussed digital barriers to adoption in enterprise contexts, including the complexity of systems and, as found in the literature, the digital literacy required to use them,^[278] and the advanced digital infrastructure required, including significant computational capacity.^[279]

Usability issues raise distinct accessibility challenges for racial and religious minorities, women, older people, and people with disabilities. This is partly related to product design: interviewees described how people with physical disabilities may not be able to use immersive hardware without adaptive technologies.^[280]

Immersive headsets typically lack compatibility with accessibility aids and are not designed with users with involuntary body/eye movements in mind.^[281] These issues may also affect blind or low-vision and deaf users: access to many devices may be limited for these users because of a lack of standardisation of functions such as subtitles. This is exacerbated by a lack of in-device accessibility personalisation.^[282]

The use of headsets has also presented challenges for racial and religious minorities, as headsets may not fit users with Afro hair types or those who wear head coverings such as hijabs and turbans.^[283]

Sensory overload, fatigue and cyber-sickness were discussed by participants as factors that limit use times. These effects have been found to disproportionately affect women^[284] and people with certain neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism spectrum disorders^[285] and ADHD.^[286] There are also challenges around the high degree of digital literacy required to operate these devices, which particularly affects older users.^[287]

Some interviewees discussed how the value propositions offered by some immersive products are weaker for women, trans people and racial minorities. Interviewees touched on limitations in features such as the number of languages supported by products and the choices of avatars.^[288] These limitations are reflected in examples where users have not been able to access services due to language barriers,^[289] and in literature discussing the limitations of user representations by VR avatars.^[290]

Some forms of inequality arising from immersive technology use may be broadly addressed by existing equality law, such as when immersive technologies are used for public service provision. Use cases in the public sector fall under the Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED),^[291] which requires public authorities to eliminate discrimination and promote equality of opportunity. While the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has prioritised preventing digital exclusion and taken steps to prevent discrimination stemming from uses of other technologies,^[292] there is currently no regulation that specifically addresses immersive technologies. This gap becomes more pronounced in contexts outside the public sector.

Steep digital and financial adoption costs may increase inequalities between service providers, in education or healthcare for example, with different levels of financial resources and access to digital infrastructure.

In consumer contexts, such as gaming and social media, financial barriers are likely to increase inequalities between users and exclude digitally disconnected people and those from lower socioeconomic groups.

Addressing these issues is aligned with both the EHRC’s prioritisation of addressing digital exclusion and the UK government’s digital inclusion plan launched in February 2025,^[293] which includes a digital inclusion innovation fund. The fund aims to increase participation and skills among digitally excluded people, access to digital infrastructure such as broadband and access to digital services. The current focus is on public services but includes medium-term plans to identify private sector services that could meet standards on inclusion.

While the EHRC has provided guidance on regulating AI in workplace contexts, which may overlap with some of use cases in enterprise contexts, there is currently no guidance on how to address the disparate challenges that workers across demographic groups may face in using these technologies, or support for workers with varying levels of digital proficiency.

Addressing these issues will require collaboration with regulators responsible for ensuring equality within specific sectors. For example, ensuring equality in healthcare will require collaboration with the Care Quality Commission to develop intersecting regulation, and in education the same applies to Ofsted.

Key sectors

We identified key sectors in which immersive technology applications are currently being deployed, drawing on a combination of sectors mentioned by interviewees and those identified through a commissioned patent analysis.

We classified these sectors into two types: horizontal (which contain use cases adopted across other sectors, such as training) and vertical (which contain use cases particular to sector-specific domains, such as healthcare). The process is described in detail in the Appendix of this paper. This resulted in a list of 11 key sectors:

• Horizontal sectors:
  • Business administration
  • Professional training
  • Product design and manufacturing
  • Commerce/retail
  • Communication/advertising
• Vertical sectors:
  • Formal education
  • Healthcare
  • Transport
  • Gaming/entertainment/social media
  • Military/security/policing
  • Public sector

Specialised functions

From heads-up displays in car windshields[294] to presenting real-time battlefield information,[295] there are many examples of use cases of immersive technologies today. To understand what technical functions of immersive technologies are harnessed to facilitate use cases within specific sectors, we analysed each of the identified use cases.

Our analysis of use cases demonstrates that while immersive technologies may be potentially multifunctional, most immersive technology use cases make use of specialised functions (such as information overlay) to augment particular tasks (such as delivering instructions) in specific sectors (such as product manufacturing). Specifically, we identified six types of specialised function found across use cases.

Specialised function: Information overlay

Real-time display of visual or audio overlay providing information, ranging from information about physical environments to providing decision-making assistance and instructions.

Industries and use cases

• Military/security/policing:
  • Smart glasses for live image recognition such as bystander identification in warzone areas^[296]
  • AR glasses to display live battlefield information including topography and equipment status^[297]
• Commercial/retail:
  • IKEA AR furniture placement software
  • Sherwin-Williams paint colour testing software
• Healthcare: Decision support system for chemotherapy drug preparation^[298]
• Manufacturing: Boeing implementation of AR smart glasses for pilots; supplying line-of-sight instructions during wiring of aircraft parts, reducing assembly time and improving productivity^[299]

Specialised function: Immersive simulation

Use of immersive technologies for the simulation of situations/environments.

Industries and use cases

• Training: Simulating nuclear power plant deactivation.^[300]
• Healthcare:
  • Physical therapy and rehabilitation
  • Training for administering intravenous injections^[301]
  • Therapeutic counselling
• Military/security/policing: Aviation simulation training; warfare with surrogate weapons
• Transport: Driving practice and training through VR

Specialised function: Virtual communication/collaboration

Use of immersive technologies for communication or remote collaboration

Industries and use cases

• Business administration: Remote virtual meetings, possibly with biometric analysis
• Manufacturing & transport: Cross-national team design cooperation in immersive virtual spaces for car manufacturing
• Commerce/retail: Non-fungible token (NFT) marketplaces in IVWs
• Public sector: South Korean municipal services delivered through virtual worlds
• Gaming/entertainment/social media:
  • Virtual concerts in IVWs, such as Fortnite’s Travis Scott concert
  • Social and gaming platforms (e.g. VRChat)
  • Social platforms (e.g. Horizon Worlds, VR Chat), including games with social interaction capabilities (e.g. Gorilla Tag, The Devouring)
• Education: Immersive classrooms^[302]

Specialised function: Immersive teleoperation

Use of immersive technologies for the remote operation of a device.

Industries and use cases

• Healthcare: Remote surgery using MR headsets to control robot arms^[303]
• Military/security/policing: Remote drone operation for warfare using VR headsets^[304]

Specialised function: Immersive visualisation

Use of immersive technologies for the visualisation of content

Industries and use cases

• Design: 3D interactive product prototyping
• Education: Immersive experience showcasing cell structure by simulating travelling through bloodstream^[305]
• Business administration: Office applications and productivity apps such as word processors, supplied in VR or AR^[306]

Specialised function: Immersive evaluation

Use of immersive technologies for evaluating users. This can be combined with other functions (e.g. performance evaluations of users of immersive simulations can be conducted by leveraging data points which the technology collects through the simulation).

 Industries and use cases

• Healthcare:
  • Decision support system for chemotherapy drug preparation^[307] (adherence to protocol)
  • Remote surgery using MR headsets to control robot arms^[308]
  • Diagnostic tools through immersive experiences, e.g. diagnosis of autism^[309]
• Transport: Driving practice and training through VR^[310]
• Education: Student scoring using eye tracking data to measure performance^[311]
• Manufacturing and design: 3D interactive product prototyping

The functions described above are specialised. Whilst immersive technologies can often provide multiple functions, in practice, use cases reveal that single or combinations of few specialised functions tend to be leveraged to achieve the purpose of a given use case. For example, Boeing’s use of AR glasses such as Microsoft’s Hololens to augment aircraft wiring repair through information overlay[312] could also draw on the capacity of the Hololens to collect facial, eye movement and voice data to conduct immersive evaluations of workers. While immersive communication, collaboration and evaluation can be integrated, probably facilitating some of the most broad use cases (e.g. social interactions) these still mostly take place in commercial contexts and are still siloed. People do not go on to use them in a deeply integrated way: they have their social interactions and then take the hardware off and go to work.

Horizontal sector use cases

This section provides a high-level description of the uses of immersive technologies in each of the identified horizontal sectors and an overview of their regulatory landscape.

Business administration

This industry was identified in our commissioned patent analysis, with 5 per cent of patent families falling under it. There has been increasing investment in use cases such as immersive virtual meetings and remote collaboration software as a result of the boom in remote business meetings during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.^[313]

However, the use of immersive technologies in business administration goes beyond remote meetings and collaboration. Many uses require employees to become end users of immersive products to support carrying out tasks.

Other use cases relate to training and evaluation. For example, in AR workspaces, biometric data on head position, head height and orientation can augment employee evaluations by indicating factors such as fatigue.^[314] Products aimed at worker evaluation, such as Voxware’s AR glasses,[315] tend to relate to measuring worker productivity and are often sold to employers.

The regulatory needs in applications that augment sector-specific tasks are included under their respective sectors below. Here, we discuss the general regulatory implications of augmenting job execution using immersive technologies, particularly for regulators tasked with protecting workers.

Specialised functions: Information overlay, virtual communication/collaboration, immersive teleoperation, immersive visualisation

Augmented task(s): Job execution

Sectors: Business administration, cross-sector adoption of immersive technologies in enterprise contexts (product design and manufacturing, communication/advertising, formal education, healthcare, transport, military/security/policing, public service delivery)

Examples: Information overlay used by military personnel and healthcare workers; immersive simulation applications in education and healthcare used to augment teaching and therapeutic practices; immersive evaluation used in measuring student performance or diagnosing patients; immersive teleoperation of robots by surgeons and military personnel; immersive communication and collaboration applications used by office workers.

Potential impacts: Upskilling will be required, and needs and challenges may vary depending on workforce demographics and socioeconomic composition. Accessibility issues may mean that not all workers can use applications. While these use cases may improve workers’ productivity, prolonged use may cause increased strain.

Applications may involve a substantial increase in employee data collection, which has privacy and data protection implications. Reduced physical interaction and the potential for micromanagement via sensors in immersive products could negatively impact interpersonal connection in the workplace.[316]

Specialised function: Immersive evaluation

Augmented task(s): Employee evaluations

Sectors: Cross-sector

Examples: Immersive evaluations are a specialised function of immersive technologies that can be combined with other functions. For example, they can be integrated into use cases that augment task completion or training to evaluate their performance.

ClassesInVR is an immersive virtual world which situates users in a classroom, where they can see their peers and teachers in avatar form. Though its primary use is to teach students, the platform also allows teachers to evaluate students’ engagement based on headset or hand controller position and orientation and eye-tracking data.[317]

Potential impacts: Job security may be dependent on the appropriateness and fairness of evaluation tools. Disparate challenges in using immersive technologies could result in discrimination against less tech-savvy or digitally literate workers.

Increased collection of workers’ biometric data through the use of immersive evaluations poses risks to privacy and data protection, particularly when using externally provided hardware. The process and purpose of evaluations may be less clearly explained to workers in the context of automated evaluations.

Regulatory landscape

While the Health and Safety at Work Act[318] mandates employers to provide a safe working environment, it does not fully account for the unique risks posed by the use of immersive technologies to augment tasks, such as cognitive load and ergonomic strain from prolonged use of immersive devices.

The Act also does not account for the potential impacts of immersive evaluations and augmentation of job tasks on employees’ wellbeing due to increased managerial oversight and expectations.

Similarly, the UK Employment Rights Act 1996 provides no protection to workers from job losses due to automation, and it does not regulate AI and algorithmic management tools which are used for immersive evaluations.[319]

Although the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) enforces safety standards, its reach currently extends only to users and not to providers of immersive technologies. This means that developers of this technology are not subject to regulatory oversight for design and product choices which may have adverse effects once in use.

As a result, workers are vulnerable to risks and challenges which arise from product development and design choices, such as data collection and storage capabilities, which may enable invasive evaluation and monitoring practices in the workplace. These risks are particularly pressing given the rapid adoption of algorithmic management tools in the workplace: around 79 per cent of companies in the OECD’s surveyed European countries say that they are adopting workplace monitoring.[320]

Addressing impacts on workers requires collaboration between regulators tasked with protecting workers and other horizontal and sector-specific regulators. Many of the issues concerning workers have to do with equality and non-discrimination, so they would benefit from input from the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC).

Similarly, collaborative engagement with sector-specific regulators is required to address the nuances of specific contexts of deployment. For example, all uses of information overlay are likely to present risks to equality, privacy and data protection, and health and safety.

However, specialised consideration is also needed in some sectors. For example, in the manufacturing sector, to protect workers from additional risk of accidents and injury when using information overlay applications in warehouse work environments.

Similarly, the vulnerabilities of workers impacted by performance and evaluation use cases are likely to differ from sector to sector depending on factors such as levels of job security. Engagement from sector-specific regulators can provide insight into detailed safeguarding requirements for workers in each sector.

Professional training

In this sector, the use of VR simulations were widely discussed by our interview participants as applications that can augment experience-based training. One interviewee gave the example of a simulation used in medical training to rehearse procedures (such as surgeries) on the body.^[321]

Another interviewee discussed an application used to simulate how to deactivate a nuclear power plant,^[322] stating that it is ‘much harder and more expensive to simulate in real life’.^[323] Training by simulation has also been popular in other sectors, such as in car driving simulators for learners.^[324]

One interviewee mentioned the use of immersive technologies to augment training in the aviation industry, for example to conduct flight simulations.^[325] This was particularly prevalent in the context of military flight training,^[326] with one interviewee emphasising the risks of physical simulations, and therefore the incentive for militaries to adopt immersive technologies.^[327]

Similarly, immersive simulations have been used for training in the rail industry.^[328] Another notable use case was in agriculture, where immersive technologies have been used to augment worker training.

Immersive technology functions have also been leveraged to augment military training for warfare simulation through the use of ‘surrogate weapons’. These are replicas of real weapons with haptic and sensory capabilities imitating real-world use, which are used alongside AR or VR headsets.^[329]

Specialised function: Immersive simulation

Augmented task(s): Professional training

Sectors: Cross-sector. Notable sectors adopting immersive technologies for training include healthcare, transport and the military.

Examples: Immersive simulations for training healthcare practitioners, such as surgery procedures for medical students,[330] and simulations for trainees to practise using intravenous injection administration;[331] simulations for military personnel, such as the British military’s use of VR to simulate high-speed jet piloting and parachuting;[332] simulations of nuclear power plant meltdowns for operator trainees, allowing them to experience and practise protocol without being in physical danger.

Potential impacts: Beyond the equality and data protection impacts detailed above, the preparedness of employees for safety-critical situations, such as military operations or nuclear meltdowns, is contingent on the quality of these products and their applicability to real-world contexts.

Regulatory landscape

The HSE is also relevant to the training sector given its emphasis on health and safety training,[333] and it provides some guidance relevant to the use of immersive simulations in workplace training.

More specifically, the Health and Safety at Work Act of 1997[334] and the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999[335] provide general guidance on the safety and adequacy of employees.

But the Act, or any related guidance does not specify how this applies to technological training generally, or immersive technologies specifically. Current use cases of immersive simulations for training are therefore not addressed by the Act or related guidance, and there is no guidance on aspects such as simulation realism, content or cognitive strain of immersive simulations, all of which have been shown to determine the effectiveness of the training.[336]

Considering that immersive training use cases exist across sectors, providing specific guidance also requires engagement from sector-specific regulators tasked with ensuring standards of training in their sector, such as the General Medical Council and the Ministry of Defence.

Some of these regulators have already taken initiative in this area. For example, the Defence Modelling and Simulation Coherence Office within the Ministry of Defence has established a specific set of requirements through its policy framework. More specifically, Section 15 of Joint Service Publication 939 states: ‘It is important to stress that XR may not necessarily be the ideal solution to meet the requirement.’[337]

These requirements are under the remit of the Defence Safety Authority regulator, also housed within the Ministry of Defence. It is difficult to fully assess how strict these requirements are and what specific XR applications they address as many of these documents are not accessible to the public.[338]

Product design and manufacturing

Interviewees mentioned a range of use cases of immersive technologies in product design, particularly due to its potential to help in several steps of the design pipeline.^[339]

One interviewee alluded to the use of immersive technologies in rendering 3D and interactive prototypes,^[340] augmenting users’ ability to experiment with different aspects of design such as sizing, and to evaluate the product from all dimensions without having to physically manufacture it.^[341]

Another interviewee pointed to the advantage of designing products through immersive technologies compared with using traditional methods such as sketching, noting the augmented ability of the user to design products ‘live’.[342]

Interviewees also noted promising use cases in manufacturing. For example, the ability to connect those involved in the design process in a virtual space to experiment on the product being worked on.^[343] This, an interviewee suggested, might explain the studies showing shortened design and manufacturing timelines for processes using immersive technologies.^[344]

Another interviewee noted the relatively longstanding use of immersive technologies by car manufacturers to allow cross-national teams to cooperate on designs in immersive digital spaces.^[345] This has also been the case in the aviation industry, such as Boeing’s use of information overlay to guide supply chain workers in the wiring of parts.^[346]

Another interviewee mentioned the use of immersive technologies in weapons manufacturing,^[347] where immersive technologies are used at several stages, including manufacturing simulation, ergonomic studies, prototyping and usability testing.^[348]

Specialised functions: Immersive teleoperation, virtual communication and collaboration, immersive visualisation

Augmented task(s): Manufacturing and design decision-making

Sectors: Manufacturing/design

Examples: The use of virtual reality by workers to collaborate when developing product designs, such as Siemens’ use of VR to conduct quality control and simulate manufacturing processes.[349]

Potential impacts: Product quality standards may vary depending on the success of immersive technology integration such as immersive visualisation in manufacturing. Poor digital twins of products may result in poorer product design decisions, poorer quality control and a higher prevalence of manufacturing errors, potentially making products less safe.

Regulatory landscape

The Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS) is a significant operator with regard to the downstream impacts on consumers of manufacturing and design, including use of immersive technologies. The General Product Safety Regulations of 2005 are particularly relevant to ensuring that new products are safe and that goods produced by new methods remain safe.

Commerce/retail

The development of immersive technologies in the commerce/retail space was identified as significant in both our commissioned patent analysis and the interviews. Several interviewees noted the use of augmented reality (AR) through QR codes enabling customers to visualise products. A prominent example is IKEA’s use of AR to allow customers to envision furniture in their living space,^[350] or Sherwin-Williams’ AR tool allowing customers to test colours before buying paint.^[351]

Another interviewee noted the creation of marketplaces in IVWs where users can buy and sell goods virtually.^[352] This has happened particularly in the case of NFT goods, where specialised marketplaces where digital goods are bought and sold have emerged in virtual environments.^[353]

Specialised functions: Virtual communication and collaboration, immersive simulations

Augmented task(s): Shopping

Sectors: Commerce/retail

Examples: Immersive virtual markets can be used to exchange digital goods such as NFTs. These markets can also take the form of immersive simulations of marketplaces, such as Decentraland, where users can trade and buy assets such as virtual real estate, goods and NFTs.[354]

Potential impacts: The rise of digital markets in immersive spaces opens new avenues for fraud, cyberattacks, intellectual property violations and unclear regulatory compliance for digital assets.

Regulatory landscape

As touched on in the DRCF’s immersive technologies foresight paper,[355] the new marketplaces which may arise from immersive technologies, and the potential for consumers to be subject to fraud, intellectual property violations and cyberattacks, are relevant to multiple regulators.

Issues of financial fraud may primarily fall under the remit of Ofcom and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), particularly under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000[356] and the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds legislation.[357]

However, there is regulatory uncertainty as to how this legislation and guidance applies to goods which are not so obviously financial goods, such as virtual items and real estate.

Appropriate measures may not yet be in place to prevent fraud relating to digital items such as virtual real estate, skins or emotes. Apart from the FCA’s guidance on protecting vulnerable consumers,[358] there is also a scarcity of regulation addressing how certain groups may be disproportionately affected by these frauds.

Regulators such as the FCA may find Ofgem’s consumer vulnerability protections[359] a useful model for addressing this uncertainty through monitoring and tracking capabilities, alongside the existing research and analysis of the CMA on vulnerable consumers.[360]

Communication/advertising

The use of immersive technologies in communications and corporate marketing^[361] was another prevalent theme in the patent analysis and interviews.

Advertising can take place in IVWs, either through traditional mediums (signs, billboards) or through the dedicated immersive experiences. One interviewee noted that such experiences could be a more effective way to increase companies’ capacity to steer consumer decision-making than traditional digital advertising methods.^[362]

Another interviewee noted the potential to leverage immersive simulations for humanitarian communication in fields such as climate change. They suggested that immersive simulations were potentially promising in supporting attitude and behaviour change, and informing a younger generation.^[363]

This view has been empirically supported in several studies, where VR interventions have been successful in changing attitudes to climate change.^[364] Critics claim that such interventions are manipulative given the contentious evidence about their efficacy at changing behaviours beyond attitudes.

While these uses have been empirically effective at changing attitudes on topics including climate change,[365] refugees[366] and mental health,[367] there is a lack of evidence of users’ actual changed behaviours, or that the attitude changes last beyond the experimental context.

Specialised functions: Immersive simulations, virtual communication and collaboration

Augmented task(s): Advertising and media consumption

Sectors: Communication/advertising

Examples: Virtual representations of billboards within IVWs; immersive simulation experiences which in themselves serve as advertisements, such as UK cheese manufacturer Boursin’s ‘Sensorium’ where users can roam inside a fridge.[368]

Potential impacts: The integration of profiling algorithms with immersive technologies enables the creation of highly personalised advertisements that draw on biometric, behavioural and emotional data collected through virtual communication and collaboration environments, such as IVWs.

By tailoring content to individual users with unprecedented precision, these systems can significantly increase advertising effectiveness.[369] However, this also raises serious concerns around privacy and user autonomy.

Regulatory landscape

There is currently no specialised regulation for advertising within immersive virtual environments, such as the metaverse. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has emphasised that adverts must be clearly identifiable as such, especially for young children.

But ASA guidance on enhanced disclosure remains vague and lacks specificity – a particular challenge in IVWs given the new forms of advertising which may arise in these spaces.

Beyond the three-dimensional forms of media which are unique to IVWs, the new mediums through which advertising could be conducted, including interaction-based advertising through ‘digital influencers’ or immersive experiences, remains unaddressed by the ASA.

It may also be difficult to distinguish between entertainment, education and advertising, placing such content in an unclear regulatory landscape.[370] For example, the use of large sponsored virtual events, such as Nike’s Nikeland, a virtual world hosted in Roblox to advertise Nike products through games and collaborative areas,[371] could be considered both entertainment and an advertisement.

Some issues related to targeted advertising, such as the use of biometric data to tailor marketing approaches, fall under the remit of the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). However, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is ambiguous on profiling, explicit consent, and the use of non-identifiable biometric and emotional data for personalised targeting.

This means that the it is challenging to address the specific complexities of AI-driven, immersive advertising that collects and processes large volumes of sensitive data. This poses risks to user privacy and autonomy, especially when advertising targets vulnerable audiences such as children.

The lack of specific guidance on marketing in the metaverse pose a particular risk to children, given their higher susceptibility to advertisements.^[372] IVWs tend to be predominantly used by children. For example, it is estimated that around 40 per cent of Roblox’s user base are children under 13 .^[373]

Advertisements in this context may be personalised based on children’s profiles and tailored to their parasocial relationships within the platform to make them more effective.^[374]

While the ASA has touched on advertising in the metaverse,^[375] its definition of ‘clearly identifiable advertisements’ leaves ambiguities about new forms of advertising in IVWs which children are highly susceptible to, such as digital influencer endorsements and experience-based advertising.

The ICO’s requirements around targeting children with advertising do not explicitly address targeting based on emotional or affective data points which immersive technologies can collect, as this data may not fall under the ‘special category’ data (although in most cases it will still meet the standard for ‘identifiability’ and so be personal data).

This paints an unclear regulatory picture, whereby children, who are disproportionately vulnerable to advertising could still be targeted through new mediums of highly-personalised marketing in immersive virtual worlds.

Resolving this unclear regulatory picture will require collaboration between the ISO and the ASA to develop regulations specific to immersive technologies and address the susceptibility of children to advertisements within these new mediums. This process may require broader questions about data collection and processing practices to be raised and re-evaluated.

Vertical sector use cases

This section provides a high-level description of the uses of immersive technologies in each of the identified vertical sectors and an overview of their regulatory landscape.

Formal education

Immersive technology use cases are found within formal education settings, such as schools and universities, particularly among learners under the age of 18.

Immersive technologies have found various uses within an educational context. Their capacity to place users in environments which may otherwise be inaccessible has led to uses aimed at educating through immersive experiences.^[376]

One interviewee gave the example of a VR learning simulation of a science laboratory:

‘You can conduct like chemistry experiments without needing the actual kits, which are extremely costly, reducing the risks because we’re talking about like hazardous chemicals and you can just conduct all of these things pretty easily with either VR or MR.’^[377]

Another example is use of immersive simulations for demonstrating cell division.^[378]

Immersive technologies may be adopted as a component of educational curricula, increasing practical, visual and experiential learning methods. Traditional non-immersive methods may either be complemented – or de-prioritised – in favour of immersive learning experiences.

Aside from delivering material, immersive technologies may be used to score students through metaverse-enabled immersive learning environments, through built-in questionnaires or by measuring learning behaviours and cognitive states using biometric data such as eye movement, facial expressions and heart rate.^[379]

Specialised functions: Immersive visualisation, immersive simulations, immersive communication and collaboration

Augmented task(s): Student learning

Examples: Virtual learning environments such as virtual classrooms with student and teacher avatars;^[380] animating children’s drawings in a museum to foster engagement;^[381] immersive visualisations of complex molecule structures.^[382]

Potential impacts: These use cases may enhance certain elements of education^[383] but they are also related to health impacts such as headaches and eye strain, and to privacy concerns. Additionally, the appropriateness of evaluation tools may disproportionately impact young people.

The adoption of immersive visualisation is limited by factors such as educational budgets and digital literacy levels, with risks of disparate access across demographic and socioeconomic groups that could deepen existing educational inequalities.

Immersive educational experiences designed with a one-size-fits-all approach may disadvantage students who require more personalised approaches, particularly if the technology is used as a substitute for human-interaction based approaches.^[384]

The use of immersive technologies reduces student–teacher interaction and weakens relationships, which may negatively impact students’ academic performance and overall wellbeing.^[385]

Specialised functions: Immersive evaluation

Augmented task(s): Student evaluation

Examples: While not currently implemented in schools, academic literature points towards the potential use of immersive technologies to evaluate aspects of student engagement such as cognitive load and fatigue.^[386]

Potential impact: Students may be evaluated using biometric markers collected by immersive technologies, including eye movement, head placement and heart rate variability.

Reliance on immersive technologies will add to concerns about digital literacy becoming a determinant of student performance. There are also concerns about non-objective and contentious measures of performance being used to measure academic success.^[387]

Regulatory landscape

There is currently no guidance on immersive technologies in formal education contexts. However, the Office for Students (OfS), which has funded projects to promote the use of immersive technologies for students, has ongoing initiatives to explore the use of immersive technologies such as VR to support students’ mental health.^[388]

The Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills in England (Ofsted) has not made any direct reference to immersive technologies, and nor have other relevant regulators such as the teaching regulation agency.

Ofsted has published general guidance on the use of AI in education, which has some overlaps with immersive technology use cases. This sets out that Ofsted will evaluate use of AI in an educational setting using the criteria in their existing education inspection framework,^[389] with no specific criteria for the use of AI.

Moreover, the guidance states that Ofsted is not typically empowered to set detailed technology policy for schools and will not inspect the quality of AI tools directly, but will instead focus on downstream effects of the technology, such as how they impact the quality of education and student experiences.^[390]

There was also no mention of immersive technologies or student scoring in the UK government’s ‘Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) in education’ report from January 2025.^[391]

This contrasts with the need for explicit evaluation of EdTech’’s technological capabilities, alongside the pedagogy which underpins it, particularly after the closure of the 2011 closure of BECTA (British Educational Communications and Technology Agency).[392]

Addressing immersive technology use cases in this sector is also a priority in terms of protecting children, which falls under the remit of sector-specific regulators, the Department for Education and Ofsted.

Healthcare

Healthcare use cases were a common theme in both interviews and our commissioned patent analysis. A significant use case was the use of VR functionalities in treating mental health conditions, and neurological disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder^[393] and dementia.^[394] This can take many forms, such as role-playing and simulations in exposure therapy, as well as virtual therapy sessions.

The use of MR headsets to aid surgical procedures was also discussed. Remote surgery was an example provided by an interviewee, where the surgeon uses the headset to control a robot arm that conducts the operation.^[395]

Patient-facing use cases were also mentioned, including for physical therapy, fitness and exercise.^[396] Interviewees described how these use cases gamify these experiences, making them more entertaining for patients and thus improving outcomes:

‘[If] it makes it more fun and engaging, maybe we’ll do more of that therapy because we know that the more trials of rehab training that person does, the better the outcomes.’^[397]

AR use cases for drug manufacturing and preparation were also mentioned.^[398] One example is the use of AR to enhance the preparation of chemotherapy drugs by providing a decision support system through which they can be prepared with step-by-step guidance.^[399]

Case studies of immersive products in healthcare contexts have direct and indirect impacts on patients. These need careful consideration not only from regulators tasked with ensuring standards of care and safety in healthcare settings but also from those responsible for regulating medical devices, standards for good medical practice and equality.

Specialised function: Information overlay

Augmented task(s): Practitioner decision-making

Examples: Decision-support AR used to aid the preparation of chemotherapy drug administration; assisting healthcare practitioners in making decisions such as appropriate dosage;^[400] AR to support trauma care by visualising internal organs of injured soldiers on the battlefield and providing guidance on appropriate procedures.^[401]

Potential impacts: Hospitals with better facilities will be able to afford to use the technology to improve their clinical practice and patient care. However, dependence on information overlay systems renders patients susceptible to technical malfunctions and to algorithmic biases, which have been well documented in decision support systems in healthcare.^[402] This perpetuates inequalities and disproportionately affects minorities not represented in training data in safety-critical contexts.^[403]

This impact is exacerbated by the undermining of professional authority through an over-reliance on healthcare technologies.^[404] Another potential impact is information overload because of poor design heightening distractions and obstructing clinical practice.^[405]

Lastly, if suitability for healthcare roles becomes conditional on proficiency with systems’ use, practitioners with a background in institutions with lower financial resources may be deemed less qualified for roles for which they have been trained.

Specialised function: Immersive simulations

Augmented task(s): Therapeutic treatment

Examples: Exposure therapy for patients with PTSD, such as Georgia Tech and Emory University’s Virtual Vietnam from 1997 or newer iterations such as University of Southern California’s Brave Mind programme for military veterans.^[406]

Potential impacts: The success of these methods is contingent on digital literacy and the quality of the immersive simulation, which could have adverse effects, such as re-traumatisation, if not implemented appropriately.[407]

The effectiveness of treatments may also hinge on how contextually relevant these environments are for patients of different backgrounds and experiences.[408]

Specialised function: Immersive teleoperation

Augmented task(s): Surgical procedures

Examples: Surgeons perform surgeries remotely using immersive teleoperation of robotic systems alongside immersive technologies such as VR.^[409]

Potential impacts: Remote operations may impact patient–doctor relationships, as doctors no longer need to be physically present during the operation. This would particularly affect procedures where patient–doctor interaction is important, such as those where the patient is conscious.^[410]

High costs mean that only well-financed hospitals with adequate infrastructure can use the technology. Healthcare professionals may be susceptible to new forms of physical strain when teleoperating, such as visual fatigue,^[411] and procedures may be vulnerable to technical malfunctions.

Specialised function: Immersive evaluation

Augmented task(s): Patient diagnosis

Examples: Use of VR to assess children for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).^[412]

Potential impacts: Concerns have been raised about the validity of data-driven diagnosis. This includes fairness issues resulting from misrepresentative data samples, and the risk of automation leading to an oversimplification of the diagnosis of neurodivergent conditions that present differently in different individuals.^[413]

Regulatory landscape

The Medical Devices Regulation (MDR), enforced by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), significantly broadened the scope of what qualifies as a medical device. It now includes software used for diagnosis, prognosis, treatment and monitoring, encompassing many immersive technology healthcare applications. All such devices were upgraded from Class I to Class II, meaning that they require third-party validation for safety and efficacy.

The MHRA’s latest guidance clarifies that immersive technologies used in digital mental health are regulated under the MDR only if they qualify as Software as a Medical Device (SaMD) – specifically, if they perform clinical tasks and target diagnosable conditions.

This creates a regulatory gap for sub-clinical or general wellbeing applications, such as life coaching, which are exempt from MDR oversight. The Medicines and Medical Devices Act 2021 does not apply to devices which are typically considered ‘non-clinical’, therefore exempting those used to infer a user’s state of mind or emotions.

Beyond guides such as the British Orthopaedic Association’s guidance on robotics in surgery, and the World Health Organization’s surgical safety checklist,[414] there is little clarity on governance mechanisms or regulations covering the use of immersive teleoperation.

Some non-directed regulations may apply, such as the General Medical Council’s ‘Good Medical Practice’. Existing guidance on immersive technologies in healthcare, such as the Health Innovation Network’s recent recommendations paper[415] provide regulatory guidance and recommendations for the use of immersive technologies in healthcare.

Additionally, immersive tools used solely for healthcare education or training are not explicitly regulated under MDR unless they are being used in the NHS, where they must meet the Digital Technology Assessment Criteria (DTAC). Outside the NHS, such tools operate in a largely unregulated space.

Given the sector-specific nature of healthcare training, ensuring worker safety in the use of immersive technologies will require collaboration between the MHRA, the General Medical Council and the HSE. Government department involvement may also be necessary, such as the Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s endorsement of Innovate UK’s Immersive Technologies in Healthcare initiative,[416] which has been working on regulation for this sector.[417]

Transport

Transport was another key industry identified in our commissioned patent analysis (3 per cent of all patent families), although it was not touched upon by interviewees.

Uses of immersive technologies in transport include VR and AR in vehicles for overhead displays and safety demonstrations.^[418] Immersive technologies are used in autonomous vehicle applications to augment safety, usability and overall user experience.[419]

Immersive technologies have also found popular use cases for workers in the transport sector, such as the integration of AR for heads-up displays for train conductors.^[420]

There have been notable uses of immersive technologies in trains, cars and planes to aid technical functionality, enhance the experience of passengers and drivers, and manufacture vehicles. These applications result in a series of tangible use cases with impacts relevant to transport regulators.

Specialised functions: Information overlay

Augmented task(s): Driver decision-making

Examples: Live information display for drivers and passengers, such as AR overlays that display speedometers, navigation directions and dynamic risk zones beneath neighbouring vehicles, indicating safe following distances in traffic,^[421] and visual cueing systems to mitigate driver motion sickness.^[422]

Potential impacts: Drivers and passengers may over-rely on information overlay systems for crucial driving and safety information. Prolonged use may have physiological impacts on drivers, such as eye strain, which may increase the risk of driver error.^[423]

The risk of over-reliance is made worse if technology such as risk-zone detection AR contains algorithmic biases as a result of a lack of representativeness in the dataset which it has been trained on.

Specialised functions: Immersive visualisation, virtual communication and collaboration, data visualisation and information overlay

Augmented task(s): Manufacturing and design decision-making

Examples: Information overlay for mechanical engineers to visualise and edit vehicle design through AR goggles and motion sensors,^[424] allowing them to make decisions such as the size and positioning of components; use of immersive simulation to create digital twins of manufacturing plans, allowing experimentation with new manufacturing methods.^[425]

Potential impacts: If implemented without appropriate safety standards, the use of immersive technologies in the automotive industry could have downstream impacts on quality control and safety standards, such as the potential for design flaws to go unnoticed due to poor quality immersive technology visualisations.

Over-reliance on these technologies creates risks if the accuracy of the immersive content used in manufacturing fails to enhance safety-critical decisions in the production process.^[426]

Regulatory landscape

The use of immersive technologies to augment car manufacturing is regulated by the UK Vehicle Certification Agency (VCA).

The VCA has various sets of guidelines and certifications which are relevant to the implementation of information overlay in vehicles, but it has no regulatory guidance specific to information overlay or the standardisation and quality control of vehicle manufacturing.

Outside the UK, Regulation no. 121 of UNECE (United Nations Economic Commission for Europe) has regulations relevant to the implementation of information overlay in vehicles, which covers the placement of hand controls, tell-tales and indicators in vehicles.

However, guidance under this regulation is not specific to immersive technologies and information overlay; it deals mainly with the necessity, visibility and reachability of ‘indicators’, regardless of the form they take.

As a result, there is no strict regulatory guidance to mitigate the potential impacts this use case could have on strain, ergonomics and the safety risks of malfunctions.

Given that many immersive technology use cases in transport overlap with training, ensuring safety and effectiveness requires coordination between the VCA, the HSE and other relevant sector-specific bodies to address both operational and workforce safety concerns.

Gaming/entertainment/social media

Other uses of immersive technologies prevalent in both the interviews and patent analysis were those in the video game and entertainment industry. In these industries, participants stated that the primary use case was that of augmenting experiences, particularly experiences of social connection.

Interviewees mentioned the significance of immersive technologies in allowing users to experience environments which would otherwise be out of reach – ranging from science fiction, e.g. travelling to Mars,^[427] to those that may be out of reach for socioeconomic reasons, for example, visiting different cities^[428] – and the ability to share these experiences with others.^[429]

While there are notable limitations in fully integrating immersive technologies into most users’ day-to-day activities and social dynamics – highlighted by bottlenecks to broader adoption – interviewees placed significant emphasis on IVWs’ facilitation of social connections.

The entertainment industry is also seeing widespread use of immersive technologies. Participants noted their prominent use for enhancing storytelling, allowing users to step into an environment that previously was only experienced in a two-dimensional way, such on a television screen.^[430]

This has been employed in different mediums, including theatres, concerts and television.^[431] These use cases can offer users either an active role in the entertainment world they are immersed in, such as potential to interact with characters from a series (see Oculus’s Henry)^[432], or a bystander role, such as attending a concert.^[433]

Interviewees highlighted children as a key user group of these products, although there is conflicting evidence on which kinds of users are at risk. This is echoed in recent BBC reports, where a majority of VR users were said to be aged 16–34.^[434] Interviewees described children as a group with a high interest in immersive technology products,^[435] and with a relatively high level of adoption, including use for longer periods.^[436]

Interviewees discussed how commercial immersive technology applications have been targeted at children,^[437] and how children are seen as a long-term investment as they may normalise immersive experiences and affiliate with certain brands from a young age.^[438]

As described by one interviewee:

‘Kids are especially the main user of these immersive experiences as of today, especially kind of through the avenue of gaming. And so, kids are sort of seen as the first use case.’^[439]

Specialised functions: Immersive communication and collaboration, immersive simulations

Augmented task(s): Social interactions, gaming, media consumption

Examples: Some of the most popular immersive social world applications include VRChat, Horizon Worlds and Roblox, where users can navigate multi-purpose environments, play games, meet each other in lobbies and attend events together.

Potential impacts: Collaboration allows users to connect regardless of geographical location. A lack of age verification means that users are vulnerable to new forms of harassment, trolling and cyber-bullying. As found in the literature, the prevalence of children as a user group in this context poses particular risks including grooming and sexual abuse.^[440]

Regulatory landscape

There is a lack of dedicated consideration in guidance in this area, particularly regarding online safety, despite the growing prominence of immersive collaboration in gaming and social media. While IVWs fall under the remit of the Online Safety Act, further specification is needed.

The Act does not address differences between how users interact with 2D social media platforms (such as by typing and sharing content) and IVWs, which enable embodied interactions that simulate physical experiences.

In turn, there is nothing specifying how providers should monitor real-time immersive behaviour, and there are no safeguards relating to the nuanced forms of harm that can occur through embodied interactions, such as experiences of harassment. These gaps pose a particular danger to children using immersive technology applications.

Other aspects of regulation of immersive gaming, entertainment and social media overlap with the GDPR. Ambiguities about what constitutes ‘significant effects’ and ‘explicit consent’ in the GDPR and the Online Safety Act result in an uncertain regulatory landscape in relation to the collection of biometric, spatial and behavioural data in gaming and social media. And ambiguities about what count as ‘special characteristics’ in biometric data leave the regulation of emotional and interaction-based data unclear.

With regard to safeguarding children within IVWs, protecting children falls under the remit of Ofcom and in some instances the Crown Prosecution Service. Current laws in this area include the Online Safety Act and the 2003 Sexual Offences Act, which covers online offences.^[441]

These laws cover some relevant aspects, such as sexual abuse, inappropriate material, illegal content and age-restricted material. But how they apply in the metaverse is uncertain and largely untested.

Crucially, in its definition of ‘content’, the Online Safety Act does not include immersive reality platforms alongside its focus on two-dimensional forms of media in ‘traditional’ social media platforms.

This leaves ambiguity regarding how the Act applies to immersive forms of media. This means that aspects of immersive reality platforms that are unique, such as the human-to-human, interpersonal ‘conduct’ as ‘content’, and the potential for embodied experiences of harm (as opposed to witnessing harm via a monitor) are not covered.

Children may also be indirectly harmed by certain applications. For example, After School Girlfriend, an unofficial application for the Meta Quest, allows users to roleplay in a high school setting through a VR environment. This could be used to simulate the exploitation and abuse of children.

The current Online Safety Act does not cover criminal accountability in IVWs and requires further immersive-specific regulation to address the unique nature of these platforms.^[442]

The lack of detect-and-prevent capabilities in these technologies makes safeguarding challenging. The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) highlights that these immersive environments may be ‘dangerous by design’ and recommends a rolling review of legislation to ensure adequate coverage,^[443] alongside greater involvement from Ofcom to develop guidance on safeguarding these technologies for children.^[444]

While Ofcom has already commissioned work on immersive technologies,[445] harms posed by immersive social worlds require new collaboration between Ofcom and other regulatory bodies. For example, fraud in IVW marketplaces, as discussed in earlier sections of this report, requires Ofcom’s collaboration with the FCA. And harms arising from interaction-based advertising in immersive experiences could be addressed through collaboration between Ofcom, the ASA and the ICO, when addressing advertising that is AI-driven and that collects user data.

Military/security/policing

Interviewees also identified uses of immersive technologies in military and national security contexts. One referenced the use of smart glasses in a military context.^[446] For example, the HoloLens IVAS goggles produced by Microsoft and Anduril provide soldiers with real-time maps, threat detection beyond their direct view, and live data from drones and command centres to improve awareness, safety and mission decisions.^[447]

Similar uses of immersive technologies are found in policing, such as increasing policing bias awareness^[448] through simulations where police offer experience bias from the perspective of a victim, and assisting prisoners with the prisoner induction process.^[449] Immersive technologies are also used for the remote teleoperation of military machinery, such as drones.^[450]

Specialised function: Information overlay

Augmented task(s): Decision-making

Examples: AR for bystander detection; AR displaying live-feed of team members for team movement awareness; AR for real-time battlefield information, including equipment status, topographic data and target intelligence.^[451]

Potential impacts: Military personnel may be vulnerable to technology malfunction in safety-critical situations. Algorithmic biases may result in non-involved personnel, including civilians, being wrongly targeted.

Overreliance on these tools in military procedure could also present risks, such as personnel having difficulty in explaining safety-critical decisions which were informed by algorithmic processes in military devices.

Specialised function: Immersive teleoperation

Augmented task(s): Military attacks

Examples: Immersive teleoperation of military machinery, such as first-person drone piloting using VR by soldiers;^[452] bomb disposal robot ‘Taurus’ operated through VR headsets;^[453] reconnaissance robots such as Russia’s Merlin-VR UAV.^[454]

Potential impacts: The teleoperation of military machinery could increase operator safety by removing their need to be physically present in dangerous situations, but it could also leave bystanders and other personnel in the area vulnerable to biases and malfunctions.

Remote operation may have psychological consequences on operators, such as symptoms of anxiety, depression and PTSD, due to the high-fidelity live audio and video feed from these devices.^[455]

Regulatory landscape

In the UK, there are no established regulations overseeing the secure rollout of AI and machine-learning-based immersive technologies within law enforcement.

While there is some guidance for particular use cases of AI-enabled technology in the sector, such coverage of police use of biometric technologies in GDPR/ICO guidance,^[456] there is no overarching regulation on the use of AI-powered technologies within the justice system.^[457]

Given the prevalent use of immersive technologies for military training, and the sector-specific nature of it, ensuring safe and effective use will require coordination with the Ministry of Defence, particularly the Defence Modelling and Simulation Coherence Office.

Public sector

The use of immersive technologies in the public sector was a prevalent theme in interviews. One interviewee mentioned the use of IVWs for public service appointments, and the use of IVWs in Korea to create a virtual world in which people can access public services and communicate with staff.^[458]

Specialised function: Immersive communication and collaboration

Augmented task(s): Public service delivery

Examples: Use of immersive virtual ‘municipal metaverse’ for the provision of public service meetings.^[459]

Potential impacts: The use of immersive collaboration and communication for the delivery of public services may increase digital barriers to access that will disproportionately disadvantage some demographic and socioeconomic groups, potentially eroding the relationships with public bodies that groups without access to the technology have.

Regulatory landscape

The Cabinet Office is relevant in this context: while not a regulator, its binding ‘Public Value Framework’ is indirectly applicable to the use of immersive technologies in the administration of public services.^[460]

While it does not directly address the implementation of immersive technologies in public services, the framework outlines a set of criteria to ensure that public funds are used in a way that will be beneficial to the public.

The Government Digital Service (GDS) is more specifically relevant to immersive technology use in the public sector. The GDS is responsible for delivering digital government services.

The GDS’s ‘Service Standard’ outline questions that the government must ask before implementing a digital service, including why and how technology is integrated into service delivery.

However, this guidance is not specific to immersive technologies, so there is no coverage of how to maximise digital inclusivity, or indeed what high-quality public services actually mean.^[461]

Regulation in public service provision overlaps with the responsibilities of the EHRC, particularly in relation to the Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED).^[462] There is currently no direct guidance on how the PSED applies to immersive technologies.

Trend 3: Increased integration with generative AI

Interviewees discussed the integration of AI algorithms within immersive products as an established industry practice, noting that ‘AI has been a big part of XR for a long time’.[463] They also discussed a more recent trend where developers have adapted to generative AI by integrating it into immersive technology products even further.[464]

This trend may be attributed to the potential use of generative AI as a tool for increasing efficiency in immersive content development and for managing user interactions.

However, this increased integration brings a host of potential impacts on users and society, including increased vulnerability to algorithmic biases within large language models (LLMs), harms related to deepfakes, intellectual property rights violations and manipulative data collection mechanisms fuelled by highly personalised content.

The increasing integration of generative AI within immersive technologies is a trend of significance to all UK regulators, as all UK regulators are responsible for regulating AI systems deployed under their remit.^[465]

The use of AI systems to generate synthetic content for immersive environments raises particular challenges that are relevant to Ofcom, the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) and the ICO.

Cases where generative AI systems are integrated for user interaction management and utilise user interaction data to personalise content are directly relevant to the ICO, Ofcom, the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) and, in enterprise contexts where workers are end users of this technology, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).

Current guidance does not provide specific consideration to the nuanced risks that emerge from these integrations. To address potential impacts, regulators may need to revisit guidance or produce new guidance.

Immersive content generation

The rapid advance and adoption of generative AI tools is accelerating the production of synthetic content in immersive environments. This exacerbates existing risks and presents new ones that are not currently addressed in online safety or privacy and data protection guidance.

Interviewees discussed how AI algorithms are currently being used by immersive content developers to generate content more efficiently[466] and reduce the significant human effort and time this task requires.[467] They described how many of the tools that immersive content developers use are enabled by AI algorithms,[468] which create ‘new ways for artists, creators, and 3D people to make stuff more quickly’.[469]

Interviewees discussed how this use of AI tools is resulting in an increase in the amount of immersive content generated by AI.[470] This is reflected in the literature, which points to the increasing attention given to the potential of generative AI in the creation of IVWs at scale.[471] For example, Meta’s recent integration of generative AI into the Horizon World editor allows users to design metaverse worlds through prompts.^[472]

The current capacity for algorithms to generate immersive content was discussed as useful but limited.[473] This is aligned with literature on the topic, where the use of generative AI to develop 3D avatars resembling users is commonly mentioned as not ready for mass implementation.^[474]

However, there are already emerging products appearing in the market. For example, Avaturn provides a service for companies to integrate a generative AI-driven avatar creator into their game, allowing users to create 3D representations of themselves by uploading selfies.^[475]

Interviewees foresaw that the technical capacity for AI to generate immersive content would improve in the future:

‘We’ve not seen AI make 3D worlds yet, we’re starting to see [it] make AI objects, and that will be happening soon’.[476]

Interviewees discussed how this increased capacity would yield a greater volume of synthetic immersive content (content generated by AI):

‘We’re going to be generating a lot of synthetic media to fill that metaverse through generative AI … particularly the visual side of that.’[477]

One interviewee highlighted that the lines between AI-generated and human-generated content, as well as combinations of the two, are becoming increasingly blurred due to advances in generative AI.[478] This raises broader concerns about copyright and intellectual property that are relevant to the Intellectual Property Office (IPO), as it is becoming harder to distinguish what content is AI-generated.

It also fuels ongoing debates about whether AI-generated content built from scraped training data constitutes a copyright violation in the first place.^[479] These concerns mirror wider concerns about generative AI and copyright and intellectual property law, given that AI models are often trained on protected content, including art, music, written works and videos.^[480]

As convergence with generative AI increases, we may expect to see these problems extend to immersive environments due to synthetic media produced for immersive products.^[481]

A second issue that is exacerbated by synthetic immersive content has to do with fairness and non-discrimination. AI algorithms used to develop content have been found to perpetuate bias and discrimination, leading to unfair treatment or representation of certain groups.

For example, generative AI image generators such as OpenAI’s Sora have shown a variety of biases, such as depicting wealthy and successful people as exclusively white and male,[482] and couples as exclusively heterosexual. They have also reinforced stereotypes about gender and occupations, such as representing nurses as exclusively women and CEOs as exclusively male.[483]

Similar content generators implemented in immersive environments may suffer from these same biases. This may be driven by a lack of diversity in their training data and a failure to correct for this during the development of the underlying model. Some interviewees discussed how representative bias within immersive technologies may provide biased information about and representations of the physical world through both AR and more immersive technologies.

Unless this gives rise to discriminatory or harmful online safety outcomes relatively directly, this risk is unlikely to fall squarely within the remit of any UK regulator, and may therefore remain unmanaged.

The significance of synthetic media has been recognised by regulators such as the ICO in its Tech Horizons Report,[484] and the Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum (DRCF), both of which have explicitly addressed the wider creation of synthetic media.^[485] However, few regulatory bodies have directly addressed synthetic media used within immersive technologies. Regulatory approaches have instead focused on two-dimensional content.

This is concerning because guidance may therefore not account for the complexities of immersive technologies or adequately address new issues that arise from the creation and use of synthetic media in immersive environments.

For example, the DRCF’s recent report The Future of Synthetic Media^[486] defines it simply as ‘video, image, text, or audio generated wholly or partly by AI algorithms’. However, immersive media has unique characteristics that this definition might not fully capture. New modes of media such as immersive environments, immersive interactions and immersive deepfakes may present new impacts which are not explicitly addressed in existing guidance.

This can be exemplified by immersive deepfakes. While deepfakes have been explored and regulated for other technologies, most notably by the Online Safety Act’s recent updates to the Sexual Offences Act of 2003,^[487] there is still a lack of clarity about how these regulations will map on to immersive deepfakes.

While deepfakes in immersive environments that in the form of explicit photographic or video-based deepfakes may be addressed by existing regulation, there are new risks emerging from the immersive and interactive nature of the technology which are not directly addressed. For example, multi-modal deception, the ability to conduct real-time impersonation and the unique challenges in detecting fake avatars.[488]

These new risks are unlikely to be mitigated without direct consideration in guidance, and are relevant to Ofcom, as well as the ICO – when personal information is used to create immersive deepfakes.

User interaction management

The use of generative AI systems to mediate user interactions raises significant concerns around the collection and processing of personal data. This includes the increased volume and sensitivity of data gathered through the combined use of wearable sensors and large language models (LLMs). There is also a concern around the use of this data for profiling, personalisation and potentially manipulative content delivery.

This is highly relevant to UK regulators such as the ICO, the ASA and Ofcom, which have a role in overseeing data protection, advertising practices and media regulation. It also relevant to regulators and other bodies that are focused on particular groups who may be impacted by these technologies, such as the HSE in the case of enterprise use cases.

The current rapid integration of generative AI into immersive technologies is limited in terms of transparency, and there are evolving risks around new forms of data collection, consent, data security and content personalisation. This evolving landscape will require regulators to re-examine existing guidance to take into account the distinct characteristics of immersive technologies and the new implications of generative AI.

Interviewees discussed the integration of LLMs with immersive technologies as a significant development[489] emerging from the generative AI hype. More specifically, interviewees described voice and natural language interfaces as becoming better and increasingly used to manage user interactions within the immersive technology space. For example, by enabling user commands,[490] providing information[491] and aiding in decision-making.[492]

Some of this AI integration within immersive technologies has taken the form of AI-powered characters, including personalised assistants or companions. Interviewees also foresaw the potential integration of MR and AI assistants as a significant development in the future of immersive technologies.

A key form of Natural Language Processing (NLP) integration discussed by interviewees was AI characters[493] that interact with users in virtual environments. One interviewee discussed an AR application designed to help people on the autism spectrum practise social interactions with virtual agents.[494] The application, called EMooly, supports social emotional learning for autistic children by generating personalised content such as interactive activities which the user takes part in with a caregiver and an AR avatar.^[495]

Other notable use cases include powering non-playable characters in video games^[496] and VR characters aimed to provide companionship.^[497] For example, Nvidia’s recently announced ACE product integrates characters powered by small language models into video games. This provides a more fluid conversational experience to users and can even impact the progression of in-game events more significantly.^[498]

The academic literature highlights other use cases, such as AI-powered assistants that facilitate the metaverse onboarding process. These assistants guide users through virtual worlds and answer questions relating to the user’s virtual surroundings (e.g. ‘What is this building for?’).^[499] Another use case is AI companions within virtual worlds that provide emotional support for older people.^[500]

The development of smart glasses with integrated AI assistants was also discussed by interviewees.[501] There is a growing trend in enterprise investment for products that integrate AI assistants with AR. This includes Meta’s Ray-Ban AR glasses,^[502] which provide audio overlay; Orion glasses,^[503] which provide video and audio overlay; XReal’s One glasses,^[504] which provide audio and visual overlay; and the rumoured forthcoming Apple AR glasses,^[505] which are said to provide audio overlay.^[506]

Interviewees discussed smart glasses both as an improvement in hardware that is lighter than headsets, and as providing users with information about the environment through AI assistants.[507] For example, Meta’s integration of Meta AI assistant into their Ray-Ban smart glasses allows users to ask the assistant questions about their surroundings in real time.^[508]

The role of AR glasses with personalised assistants has ranged from providing information to aiding in decision-making, such as by advising gardeners on how much water is needed by certain plants.^[509] One interviewee discussed the use of image recognition in smart glasses by police forces outside the UK,^[510] highlighting how generative AI could aid officers’ decision-making in the future. For example, by analysing image data collected by smart glasses to recognise objects and flagging potentially dangerous behaviour.[511]

The expansion of immersive technology products would continue to follow two current trends according to interviewees: the development of pass-through features and MR products,[512] and the increasing investment in smart glasses with integrated AI assistants.[513]

Some interviewees in particular foresaw these two trends as coming together in the future as MR smart glasses with integrated AI assistants,[514] leveraging the benefits of each technology. This was described as ‘the processing power and the rendering power of a big VR headset into the form of a pair of glasses that can then also take advantage of AI tools to be able to bring all that together’.[515]

Interviewees felt that these products could aid in decision-making[516] and also anticipate user needs.[517] While current smart glasses products provide only AR functionalities, AI assistants have been integrated in MR headsets, such the dispatch of Meta AI on the Meta Quest 3.^[518]

Through their wearable hardware and sensors, many immersive technology products are able to create and collect data at a significantly greater scale than non-wearable products based on mobile phones and laptops.[519] The use of wearable devices also entails the collection of more sensitive data, such as biometric data, which often consists of unconscious and involuntary physiological responses.

Data controllers could process sensitive information about individuals for purposes beyond the direct provision of the product. This is because of the complexity of technology products’ terms of service and the problems with how consent is secured in practice and whether it is meaningful.[520]

The volume and sensitivity of data collected by immersive products is further amplified when user interactions are managed by LLMs, which require large volumes of data to function. The integration of LLMs may also prompt to user to disclose more sensitive data through natural language interactions. Literature suggests that users may do this because of their high levels of engagement, but also due to factors related to conversational human–computer interactions.

Users have a greater tendency to anthropomorphise devices they engage with through conversation,[521] fostering more affective dynamics that lead to longer interactions.[522] This in turn can lead to disclosures that might not have been obtained through traditional forms of interaction.[523] These dynamics have been evidenced in various products, including LLM-powered toys which elicit stronger emotional responses and increased trust from children, raising concerns about the potential for manipulative data collection.[524]

Data collected by immersive products is often processed through profiling algorithms to make inferences about users’ psychographic characteristics (for example, gender, age). The algorithms use biomarkers collected by hardware, such as head, controller and eye movements,^[525] to evaluate users and produce outputs.

For example, use cases drawing on immersive evaluation functions in workplace contexts may use employees’ physiological signals to infer behavioural traits like levels of productivity.^[526] These inferences can inform employment-related decisions, despite often being based on contested or emerging scientific assumptions.^[527]

Profiling algorithms can also be used to increase engagement or steer user decision-making by delivering personalised content such as advertising across various platforms. For example, data gathered from Meta’s Quest 3 can be used to customise advertisements shown on a user’s Instagram account.

Many interviewees discussed the potential for user manipulation through these practices.[528] Some expressed concern about how immersive technologies are ‘producing behaviours’[529] that impact human autonomy[530] and decision-making[531] in ways that are exacerbated by the sensitive nature of data collected by immersive hardware – as illustrated by one interviewee:

‘How ethical is it to change an ad based on my heart rate?’[532]

The integration of LLMs within immersive technologies entails processing through both traditional profiling algorithms and through LLM models. This can provide a more granular level of personalisation that is continuously responsive to a user’s state and environment.

Traditional profiling algorithms match users to predetermined user profile categories. These user profile categories are updated – within varying timeframes depending on individual companies’ privacy policies – and this profile data is used to provide personalised content.

LLMs, on the other hand, evaluate a much wider range of unstructured data, including input data and data retained from previous interactions, to generate personalised content in real time. With each interaction, the LLM hones its content and delivery style to increase the probability of ongoing engagement by a user.

Although it is not clear how much biometric data is currently processed through LLMs, products such as the Meta Quest 3, which has integrated Meta AI, process data collected through wearable sensors such as voice recordings, voice transcripts, images and videos. This data is used to personalise how the LLM interacts with users.^[533]

The evolving and hyper-granular responses from LLMs can be much more engaging for users, creating a feedback loop where greater personalisation drives greater engagement, which in turn fuels further data collection.^[534]

This is compounded by risks posed by biometric data collection and natural language conversations. Recent reports have suggested that the amount of and types of data processed by LLMs are growing. For example, Meta is developing AI-integrated immersive technologies with ‘super-sensing’, which involves hardware sensors that are switched on indefinitely and data fed through the AI assistant. This allows the model to give much more personalised live responses based on data collected , including facial biometrics.^[535]

Natural language interactions that are continually tailored to deliver the particular content and delivery style that most successfully promotes engagement by specific users are likely to pose higher risks related to data disclosure and user manipulation. These compounding factors have implications for both consumer and enterprise use cases of immersive technologies with LLM integrations.

In consumer contexts, the use of biometric data and LLMs could support data-driven revenue streams through the natural language delivery of advertisements or commercial suggestions. LLMs could deliver personalised responses that could enhance persuasiveness, via VR characters or personalised assistants.

Advertisements have been found to be placed within LLMs^[536] and personalised assistants have been found to hyper-nudge users.^[537] These risks could become even more pronounced if AR glasses become more integrated into daily life. As one interviewee described it:

‘All of our biometric data, our heart rate data, all of these things could be fed into a personalised spatial assistant that sits on your face and can anticipate your needs.’^[538]

In enterprise contexts, hyper-personalisation could exacerbate over-reliance on immersive technologies in decision-making. The intimate and persuasive nature of personalised interactions could lead employees to place excessive trust in AI recommendations without adequate scrutiny or verification.

Data collected by immersive technology products could also be fed into training LLMs owned by the product’s developer, which raises further privacy and security risks. Users’ consent is often obtained through ambiguous means, such as opt-out mechanisms. As competition over LLM development has intensified, these mechanisms have become increasingly opaque.

This is illustrated by Meta’s recent revision of its privacy policy for Ray-Ban smart glasses.^[539] Users are now required to store data such as voice recordings on Meta’s cloud, meaning that the only way to prevent these recordings from being used in AI training is by actively deleting them.

In terms of security concerns, companies such as Meta and Microsoft scrape data from their entire ecosystem to train their LLMs, including immersive technology data. This makes consumers vulnerable to risks such as model inversion attacks (where an attacker learns more about specific individuals) and membership inference attacks (where an attacker can identify whether an individual’s data was included in the training data).^[540]

These security risks are aggravated by the collection of biometric data through immersive technology hardware because data such as facial biometrics can be used to reconstruct faces in the training data. It can as also be used to collect sensitive information such as health conditions. Biometric data also exposes users to unique risks given that once it is compromised, it cannot be changed or replaced like passwords.^[541]

The security risks of training data are aggravated by the integration of LLM training data, which may include more diverse, personal and identifiable information given the conversational data that these systems collect. Moreover, LLMs present unique security risks because they can be manipulated into revealing sensitive or private information from their training data through carefully designed prompts.^[542]

The potential consequences of the integration of LLMs into immersive technologies are of direct relevance to regulators given the overlap with wider data protection regulation, such as the UK’s Data Protection Act of 2018,^[543] guidance on biometrics, and work on profiling and automated decision-making.^[544]

Under the GDPR, ‘special category data’ and data that can be used to identify someone is subject to stricter protections. Article 9 prohibits the processing of this data for certain purposes unless specific legal bases apply.[545] However, while data processing that enables targeted advertising in immersive virtual environments (for example, behavioural data, affective or emotional signals) could fall within the scope of special category data set out by the ICO[546] – and therefore the scope of Article 9 protection – deployers of these technologies may benefit from context-specific guidance from regulators such as the ICO and other regulators within the DRCF.

The ICO has provided general guidance on biometric data and addressed broader data collection concerns in immersive technologies through its 2022 and 2024 Tech Horizons reports. The DRCF has outlined potential harms from data processing in immersive environments in its recent foresight paper.

But there is still a need for context-specific regulatory guidance. Clearer direction on context-specific data collection practices for the new modalities and data types unique to immersive technologies could better support deployers to comply with GDPR requirements.

The black-box nature of LLMs makes it difficult to audit whether profiling is occurring through the direct use of identifiable data, or via the indirect inference of such data from correlated, non-sensitive attributes. This makes it unclear when Article 9 protections apply or have been breached, and therefore potentially makes it difficult for regulators to verify compliance.^[547] This means that certain uses of LLMs for personalised content generation, such as hyper-personalised advertising driven by LLMs, may be exempt from Article 9 protections.

Alongside relevant horizontal regulators (such as the ICO), engagement and guidance from sector-specific regulators is required to mitigate the impacts of the increasing integration of generative AI with immersive technologies across a variety of use cases to manage user interaction.

For example, in commercial uses, given the potential impact on content delivery within immersive platforms through the use of LLMs, Ofcom’s responsibilities under the Online Safety Act also have significant relevance to the challenges that LLMs in immersive technologies might pose.[548] Extra protections may need to be added to the Online Safety Act, such as to protect children from harmful or misleading synthetic content in IVWs.[549]

Similarly, specific consideration may be required from the ASA. In enterprise contexts, guidance may also be needed such as HSE guidance that addresses risks posed to workers.^[550]

Trend 4: Market dominance of big technology companies

Market dynamics in the immersive technology product landscape – specifically, the consolidation of products, power and influence among a few big technology companies – enable a handful of companies to dominate. Our interviews, commissioned patent analysis and the literature point to an immersive technology product market characterised by the dominance of big technology companies.

This dominance raises concerns about anti-competitive practices and the concentration of biometric data through the ‘loss leader’ data business strategies of big technology companies, as well as their disproportionate influence over products in the market.

These concerns are likely to require investigation and potential intervention by regulators such as the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) and the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). Government departments seeking to support national innovation and growth may need to consider broadening their scope to ensure support for SMEs.

Overview

One participant described the competitive landscape of immersive products as one in which companies are striving towards the shared goal of getting products off the ground and more broadly adopted by mainstream audiences.^[551] However, several others discussed the consolidation of a few key players in the sector, noting dominance by big technology companies such as Apple, Meta and Google.^[552] As one interviewee said:

‘I think the market is likely to be dominated by a few powerful actors.’^[553]

This is reflected in our patent analysis, which reveals a diverse group of companies operating across segments of the immersive technology supply chain. Only a select few are involved in multiple stages of the supply chain. This vertical integration further reinforces their dominance in the immersive technology industry by allowing them greater control over innovation, production and distribution.

Figure 3: The immersive technologies supply chain – top 20 companies

Figure 3 above maps twenty companies identified through our commissioned patent analysis and interviews as significant actors in immersive technologies. The companies have been mapped according to their involvement in different stages of the immersive technologies supply chain

This supply chain is divided into two sections: hardware developers, encompassing all the parts required to assemble immersive technology (for example, chips, displays, sensors and lenses) and software developers.

The ‘software developers’ section is divided into three subsections: applications and platforms, rendering engines and operating systems. Applications and platforms have been placed in the same section given their significant overlap.

More specifically, platforms tend to be available as applications, such as Meta’s Horizon Worlds^[554] and Roblox,^[555] both of which a user can access through Meta’s app store. However, not all applications are platforms in themselves.

The ‘hardware developers’ section of the immersive technology stack contains more variety of companies involved than any of the software development areas. As this section accounts for the many distinct aspects of hardware required for immersive technology development, this result is unsurprising. Key players in this section include prominent VR camera manufacturer Canon and GPU (graphics processing unit) manufacturer Nvidia.

In the software section, the number of companies involved in each sub-section narrows. Meta, Microsoft, Sony and Apple stand out as the companies involved in the most aspects of the software supply chain.

Apple stands out as the only company identified with involvement in all parts of the supply chain (i.e. hardware and software), perhaps due to its long-standing approach of vertical integration.^[556] Microsoft and Meta are both involved in every aspect except the production of rendering engines.

Figure 4: Top 20 patent applicants in all immersive technology areas, 2014–2023

 Figure 4 above plots the twenty companies with the most patent ‘first publications’ between 2014 and 2023. A first publication is the publication of the first patent in a patent family and happens eighteen months after the patent application is made. Each bar is divided into coloured segments representing the year in which these first publications occurred.

Looking at patent applications for immersive technologies across time, the earlier years reveal a more competitive and less concentrated landscape. Companies such as Microsoft and LG were among the leaders before gradually losing their dominance.

Recent years (2021-23) show a clear shift, with companies such as Meta, Tencent, Samsung and Goertek growing as key players, signalling a consolidation of dominance in the space. The number of first publications for big technology companies such as Meta, Tencent, Samsung and Goertek significantly increased in these two years, putting these companies at a noticeable distance from smaller competitors. The exception is Snap, a relatively smaller competitor, with around 5,000 employees in 2024^[557] compared to Apple’s 164,000.^[558]

When looking across all ten years, only Sony, Samsung and Goertek preserve their lead in yearly patent applications. This dominance is also evident when examining aggregate patent activity: Samsung, Meta, and Sony submitted the highest total number of patent applications across the entire 2014–2023 period.

Anti-competitive practices

Within this landscape where a few powerful actors dominate, many participants framed market dynamics as anti-competitive,^[559] expressing concern about monopolies within the industry and barriers to entry for other companies.^[560]

Interviewees highlighted a tendency of big technology companies to acquire smaller companies with a competitive edge.^[561] They also discussed how Meta’s self-promotion through the app store of its hardware increases the entry barrier for third-party app developers, relegating these applications to other app stores such as Apple’s.^[562]

This is particularly notable given Meta’s 70 per cent share of the AR/VR headset market,^[563] alongside the incompatibility of Meta Quest devices with non-Meta app stores. Interviewees drew parallels to previous anti-competitive claims brought against big technology companies.^[564]

The risk of anti-competitive practices is directly relevant to competition regulators like the CMA. One interviewee stated: ‘I think the CMA should be particularly vigilant of the immersive technology space,’^[565]

The dynamics between immersive technology companies may be of relevance, given the CMA’s remit to ensure fair competition.^[566] There are similarities and overlaps between the immersive technology market and concerns expressed in previous CMA statements about anti-competitive practices and foundation model companies.^[567]

More specifically, the dominance of big technology companies in the market falls under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act. The Act aims to create a pro-competition market and gives the CMA the ability to respond quickly and flexibility to developments in these markets. The CMA can also set conduct requirements for companies which are designated as having Strategic Market Status (SMS).

Given that the use of ‘AI with more established activities’ is part of the criteria used to identify SMS companies,^[568] and the increasing convergence of AI with immersive technologies, potential anti-competitive practices in the immersive technology market may fall directly under the CMA’s remit of ensuring fair competition under this Act.

Concentration of biometric data

The dominance of certain companies that operate ‘loss leader’ data business strategies raises privacy and competition concerns. Many interviewees discussed how anti-competitive dynamics were driven by a ‘loss leader strategy’,^[569] where companies lose money on hardware and expect to recoup it through their apps^[570] and consumer data.^[571]

Indeed, data collected by apps is used by companies to fuel their data business models. For example, Facebook, WhatsApp and Messenger data harvesting has been instrumental to Meta’s business strategy.^[572], Biometric data that is collected through Meta’s immersive hardware and processed through its applications can be similarly made use of.

This contextualises the drive to establish dominance across the immersive technology supply chain (hardware and software). As described by one interviewee: ‘It’s all about trying to prop up their own vision for how they can grow their first-party apps to eventually turn on their […] advertising business model because they’ve been subsidising all of this for years.’^[573]

Business models where data collection is central to revenue generation present concerns around companies’ financial incentives to enact invasive data practices that deteriorate user privacy and autonomy.

Companies with a wider presence across the supply chain, such as Meta and Microsoft, also benefit from greater collection and processing of user data which can be used to fuel and reinforce their dominance in the market.

This not only risks the establishment of monopolies in the sector but also exacerbates risks to privacy and autonomy due to the concentration of biometric data within a select few companies, where a few companies act as the dominant aggregators of user data within the sector. As previously noted, this raises questions for regulatory bodies including the ICO and the CMA.

Influence over product development

Interviewees discussed how big technology companies establish the trajectory of development for the rest of the market.^[574] Some interviewees noted specific trends within different companies, for example Meta showing a strong emphasis on developing consumer products over enterprise versions.

This was framed as constraining the potential development of, and limiting the range of, enterprise products in the sector, with the company’s focus on development and store curation detracting from developers’ innovation in other areas.^[575]

Interviewees pointed to the benefits of big technology companies that had not previously engaged in immersive technology development entering the market. The need for greater competition to promote greater accountability among industry leaders, as well as providing a greater variety of products and use cases, was highlighted.

This was particularly prevalent in Apple’s entry into the market with the Apple Vision Pro, creating more competition for and promoting more accountability from Meta.^[576] It also potentially encouraged developers to create a wider diversity of products.^[577] This view is supported in the literature.^[578]

One interviewee described Apple’s market entry as helping to evolve the ecosystem beyond Meta’s vision for immersive technologies. Apple ‘actually opened up the overall [immersive technology] industry to go beyond the vision Meta has, which is kind of a Ready Player One [film] inspired vision of how you would really grow this medium by having everybody play a game, whereas really the industry’s much broader’.^[579]

Policymakers invested in building national innovation capacities, such as the Department for Business and Trade, whose industrial strategy emphasises supporting small businesses across supply chains, may be interested in supporting immersive technology start-ups and SMEs. This support could help align the market towards national interests of fostering ‘homegrown’ technology capabilities.^[580]

This is particularly important for securing sovereign technology and may fall under the interests of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT). This is because of DSIT’s objective, as stated in the AI Opportunities Action Plan, of building a UK innovation growth hub through the new UK Sovereign AI unit.^[581]

In the context of immersive technologies, this will require support for UK businesses and start-ups, given that current market dynamics support larger companies that are primarily based outside of the UK.

To promote UK sovereignty in immersive technologies, DSIT could consider expanding the scope of the UK Sovereign AI unit to encompass broader AI development practices and applications, including immersive technologies.

Additionally, expanding the unit’s focus to include the key infrastructure required for AI product development could enhance UK sovereignty, not only in AI development but also in its integration with other technologies.

This in turn would strengthen the UK’s influence in markets such as immersive technologies. Interviewees discussed asymmetrical access to data^[582] and infrastructure^[583] as factors that contribute to big technology companies being dominant in the market.^[584] Support from government departments in these areas might increase the ability of SMEs to compete.

Conclusion

The hype around immersive technologies that captured the attention of investors and the media at the beginning of the decade has subsided. Stakeholders such as venture capital investors, policymakers and developers have moved their attention to the development of large language models (LLMs).

However, immersive technologies continue to see new technological developments and, most importantly, new use cases and applications in high-impact sectors. We have identified four main trends that demand attention, particularly from regulators and policymakers.

First, immersive technologies have not reached broad-scale adoption, unlike the narrative that developers have presented. Instead, they immersive technologies are currently subject to niche enterprise and consumer adoption. Bottlenecks to mass adoption include a lack of public trust, a preference for incumbent technologies, technical limitations and the financial inaccessibility of the technologies.

Regulators may want to monitor developments related to the bottlenecks illustrated in this report, as wider adoption levels would amplify the impact of any unmanaged risks, and to develop pre-emptive governance approaches.

Second, immersive technologies are currently being adopted for specialised applications in a broad array of sectors, many of which are high impact, such as education, healthcare and the military. To address current risks, regulators may also need to address how technologies are deployed today by targeting specialised use cases within the sectors mentioned in this report.

This would require updating horizontal guidance to provide specialised consideration to immersive technologies. Engagement and guidance from sector-specific regulators, who may address factors that are unique to particular use cases, will also be needed.

This report provides an overview of immersive technologies within various sectors and non-exhaustive descriptions of potential impacts. It also includes a list of relevant regulators and the immersive technology use cases that fall within their remit.

Third, immersive technologies are increasingly integrating generative AI for user interaction management and generating immersive content. This raises particular concerns and existing guidance may need to be revisited, or additional guidance issued, to ensure that these concerns are addressed.

Finally, big technology companies are dominant within the industry. This is evident in the supply chain of immersive technologies, where companies such as Meta, Microsoft and Apple have the most involvement in every step of the supply chain, as well as in patent applications.

This was echoed by interviewees for this report, who raised concerns about anti-competitive practices in the sector, the concentration of biometric data driven by ‘loss leader’ business strategies, and the disproportionate influence of big technology companies in the market.

Competition and privacy regulators may need to observe these trends, while government departments seeking to support the building of national innovation growth may consider broadening their scope to ensure support for immersive technology SMEs.

These conclusions will be expanded on in the third publication from our project Return to reality where we will explore the impacts of immersive technologies as uncovered through our literature synthesis, expert interviews and deliberative workshops. This forthcoming publication will ground discussions of impacts on real-world use cases and present key recommendations for regulators and policymakers.

Methodology

This paper is the second of three publications based on research conducted for the Ada Lovelace Institute’s project Return to reality: an exploration of immersive technologies. This paper addresses the following research questions:

• What is the timeline of immersive technology development and adoption?
• What is the current state of play of immersive technology products, including key players, domains and use cases?

To explore these questions, we used three research methods:

• desk research and a literature review
• expert interviews
• patent analysis.

Our literature review was conducted between November 2023 and May 2024. An initial review of annotated articles resulted in a set of cluster themes. We then identified priority areas and gaps from this, which we supplemented by searching for additional relevant papers and articles.

The project team conducted 26 interviews with experts working with immersive technologies, including developers, investors, academics and practitioners. Interview questions covered the following categories relevant to our project research questions: the timeline of immersive technologies, the product landscape, the technical components and impacts of immersive technologies such as risks and benefits.

Patent analysis

Patents are filed to protect new inventions, demonstrating research and development efforts by companies. Patents are therefore indicators of innovation and commercial interest in a field, and a patent landscape can be analysed to better understand trends related to investment trends, technological advancements and competition in a sector.

For example, the volume of patents related to immersive technologies can be indicative of the level innovation and commercial investment in this area. The distribution of patent applications by companies can provide insight into the competitive landscape in an area, including key players and their patenting activities. The distribution of patents across time can inform an understanding of how the technology or market dynamics are evolving.

However, patent analyses have limitations, which include risks related to not controlling for differences in the qualities of patents (such as not accounting for a number of patents being a series of updates on the same technology), and patent filings being biased towards regions with stronger intellectual property laws, overlooking innovations in regions with less rigorous patent systems.

Expertise in patent analyses is required to mitigate these risks and accurately collect patent data, interpret a patent landscape in a given field and assess the significance of individual patents.

The project team for this paper commissioned The Patent Searcher, a patent analysis company which works with IP legal practitioners, to conduct a patent analysis. This involved searching the Minesoft PatBase database^[585] for keywords related to immersive technologies. The search was conducted on 6 March 2023.

Analysis of the search results sought to provide insight into the state of play and trajectory of immersive technology innovation across sectors, examining the emergence of immersive technology software and hardware, shifts in commercial activities and the role of key players.

The patent analysis offers a snapshot of the most recent advancements and trends in immersive technologies.

We detail the process of conducting the patent analysis below.

Patent analysis: detail

To address this paper’s research questions, The Patent Searcher conducted a search and comprehensive analysis of patent data collected over the past decade.

The results were grouped by INPADOC (extended) patent family and limited to patent families where the earliest published patent family member within the family had a publication date in the last 10 years (i.e. from 1 January 2014 to 6 March 2024).

The search focused on patents containing one or more of the following keyword phrases in the title or abstract (including the machine translation of any non-English titles and abstracts) or indexed to any of the International Patent Classifications (IPC) or Cooperative Patent Classifications (CPC) as listed.

Keywords searched for in the patent analysis

virtual reality	augmented reality
mixed reality	extended reality
VR	immersive
meta_verse*	spatial computing
head-mounted display	virtual world*
virtual environment*	virtual scene*
smart glasses

IPC / CPC codes searched

G06T19/006	G06F3/011
G06F3/012	G06F3/013
G06F3/014	G06F3/015
G06F2203/012	G02B27/017
G02B27/0172	G02B2027/0174
G02B27/0176	G02B2027/0178
G06V20/20

Actual query used in PatBase (which returned 136,032 patent families)

(ATA=(virtual reality OR augmented reality OR mixed reality OR extended reality OR VR OR immersive OR meta_verse* OR spatial computing OR head-mounted display OR virtual world* OR virtual environment* OR virtual scene* OR smart glasses) OR SC=(G06T19/006 OR G06F3/011 OR G06F3/012 OR G06F3/013 OR G06F3/014 OR G06F3/015 OR G06F2203/012 OR G02B27/017 OR G02B27/0172 OR G02B2027/0174 OR G02B27/0176 OR G02B2027/0178 OR G06V20/20))

AND

EPD>(20131231)

Notes on syntax

*	Wildcard representing any string of characters.
_	Space or no space or hyphen (note that hyphens are also treated as spaces).
ATA	Title and abstract field (including machine translations).
EPD	Earliest publication date within the patents in the INPADOC family.
SC	All class field including IPC (International Patent Classification) AND CPC (Cooperative Patent Classification) as highlighted and described below.

Patent sub-classes referenced in the PatBase query

• G06: Computing; Calculating or counting
• G06T: Image data processing or generation, in general
• G06T19/00: Manipulating 3D models or images for computer graphics
• G06T19/006: Mixed reality

 

• G06F3/00: Input arrangements for transferring data to be processed into a form capable of being handled by the computer; Output arrangements for transferring data from processing unit to output unit, e.g. interface arrangements
• G06F3/01: Input arrangements or combined input and output arrangements for interaction between user and computer (G06F3/16 takes precedence)
• G06F3/011: Arrangements for interaction with the human body, e.g. for user immersion in virtual reality
• G06F3/012: Head tracking input arrangements
• G06F3/013: Eye tracking input arrangements
• G06F3/014: Hand-worn input/output arrangements, e.g. data gloves
• G06F3/015: Input arrangements based on nervous system activity detection, e.g. brain waves [EEG] detection, electromyograms [EMG] detection, electrodermal response detection

 

• G06F2203/00: Indexing scheme relating to G06F3/00 – G06F3/048
• G06F2203/01: Indexing scheme relating to G06F3/01
• G06F2203/012: Walk-in-place systems for allowing a user to walk in a virtual environment while constraining him to a given position in the physical environment

 

• G02B27/00: Optical systems or apparatus not provided for by any of the groups G02B1/00–G02B26/00, G02B30/00
• G02B27/01: Head-up displays
• G02B27/017: Head mounted
• G02B27/0172: Characterised by optical features
• G02B2027/0174: Holographic
• G02B27/0176: Characterised by mechanical features
• G02B2027/0178: Eyeglass type (eyeglass details G02C)

 

• G06V: Image or video recognition or understanding
• G06V20/00: Scenes; Scene-specific elements (control of digital cameras H04N23/60)
• G06V20/20: In augmented reality scenes

The results of the query were extracted into and prepared in Excel spreadsheet format, where the following tables were created:

• Table 1: Details of all 136,032 patent records found, where one row represented one patent family. Only available in spreadsheet.
• Table 2: A lookup table where all the original applicant names are mapped to a standardised applicant name and a single country/jurisdiction where the applicant is likely to predominantly reside or operate or conduct research. In the analysis, the standardised applicant name and their country/jurisdiction was used. Only available in spreadsheet.
• Table 3: All the class sub-groups (i.e. the IPC/CPC codes characters preceding the ‘/’) indexed to each patent family (represented by a ‘Family Number’) mapped to an industry, a sub-industry, an area of technology and a sub-area of technology. See Appendix A. Since each patent family is indexed to multiple classes, each patent family can fall into multiple industries and technology areas.

The set of patent results created and analysed should predominantly represent innovation in immersive technologies. The Patent Searcher selected and searched a set of keywords and classes that will typically only appear when the invention described in the abstract does in fact relate to immersive technologies.

This is because the selected keywords and classes are typically specific to immersive technologies and will rarely be used in a context outside of this field of technology. It is possible that the abstract for a relevant patent in the field of immersive technologies may use other keywords which we did not use here.

However, we believe that the patent results captured are a reasonable representation of the immersive technology field and for the purposes of this analysis provide an accurate reflection of the activity in this field.

The patent analysis conducted is representative of earliest publication date of patents, which tends to be roughly 18 months after the intent to commercialise is first established through a priority application. More specifically, when companies first intend to commercialise a patent, a priority application is made. Around 18 months after this, the patent is published.

As a result, the analysis conducted is delayed by approximately 18 months relative to when the underlying commercial intent actually occurred. This means that patent trends observed in the data reflect innovation decisions made 18 months earlier, creating a systematic lag between real-world commercial intent and appearance in published patent statistics.

As a result, while our analysis looks at patent publications from 2014 to 2023 (end of year), this is representative only of commercial intents from mid-2013 to mid-2022.

Year	−3	−1.5	0	+1
Event	Research and development investment begins	Earliest priority date (intent to commercialise)	Earliest publication date of patent	Actual commercialisation (product release)

Acknowledgements

This report was authored by Cami Rincon, Jorge Perez, Mahi Hardalupas and Hannah Claus, with substantive contributions by Michael Birtwistle and Andrew Strait.

We would like to thank Emmie Hine for taking the time to review earlier drafts of this report, and for her comments and contributions.

We are grateful for the work by our external partner The Patent Searcher, who conducted the patent analysis for this project.

This project was made possible by a grant from the Minderoo Foundation as part of their XR30 Fund programme.

Appendix

Eleven key sectors using immersive technologies were identified through a multi-step process detailed in this section.

First, we noted which sectors were mentioned by interviewees:

• archaeology[586]
• architecture[587]
• automotives[588]
• aviation[589]
• banking[590]
• beauty[591]
• cultural sector[592]
• design[593]
• education/ training[594]
• energy/utilities[595]
• engineering[596]
• entertainment[597]
• farming[598]
• fashion[599]
• food[600]
• gaming[601]
• industrial/logistics[602]
• insurance[603]
• manufacturing[604]
• marketing/advertising[605]
• medicine/ healthcare[606]
• military[607]
• policing[608]
• public sector[609]
• research[610]
• retail[611]

From this list, we identified the most frequently mentioned sectors in interviews.

Sectors	Mentions in interviews
Education/training	20
Medicine/healthcare	20
Gaming	17
Entertainment	12
Military	11
Design	7
Manufacturing	7
Retail	7
Marketing/advertising	7
Public Sector	5
Aviation	4

This data was complemented by a patent analysis which is detailed in the ‘Methodology’ section.

In the patent analysis, the top 10 industries with the most first publications in immersive technologies were technology (56%), communications (14%), healthcare (6%), business administration (5%), gaming / entertainment (5%), education (5%), commerce (3%), transport (3%), climate management (2%) and security (1%).

Figure 5: Top 10 industries for patent first publications in immersive technologies

‘Technology’ in this context encompasses both software and hardware such as audio producing and capturing devices, cameras, control systems and digital display systems. The technology sector category appears particularly large as it includes many patents for immersive technology hardware and software that are technical.

Moreover, since patents can have multiple sector tags in our analysis, the technology sector category captures patents that are difficult to assign to a single sector because they cover fundamental or enabling technologies with broad applicability across multiple sectors.

The technology category also includes patents which are both a technical feature of immersive technologies and relevant to a specific sector. For example, a patent for a new type of motion sensor could be relevant to the hardware of virtual reality headsets generally and also have sector-specific relevance in healthcare.

Following the patent analysis, we conducted desk-based research and drew on interviews to identify and examine specific immersive technology use cases found within each sector.

Based on an analysis of identified use cases, we classified sectors into two types: vertical sectors, composed of domain-specific use cases, for example healthcare; and horizontal sectors, composed of use cases that are adopted across multiple sectors, such as training.

This classification informed further modifications to the key sectors. For example, immersive technology use cases found in climate management were not sector-specific but were examples of communications and training applications that were deployed in climate management.

This can be demonstrated by immersive simulation. Immersive simulation can be used for training agricultural workers, which falls under the training sector, and can also be used for promoting awareness of climate change, which falls under the communications sector.

We moved these use cases under their respective sectors and removed climate management from the list of sectors. This step resulted in a final list of sectors:

• Horizontal:
  • Business administration
  • Professional training
  • Product design and manufacturing
  • Commerce/retail
  • Communication/advertising
• Vertical:
  • Formal education
  • Healthcare
  • Transport
  • Gaming/entertainment/social media
  • Military/security/policing
  • Public sector

Endnotes

[1] ‘What Are Immersive Technologies?’ <https://www.adalovelaceinstitute.org/resource/immersive-technologies-explainer/> accessed 17 June 2025.

[2] P2, P8, P9, P10, P20, P22.

[3] P10.

[4] P7, P8, P13, P14, P19, P21, P26.

[5] P9, P10, P13, P14, P18, P19, P21, P23, P26.

[6] P10.

[7] P19.

[8] P4.

[9] P10.

[10] P2, P4, P7, P9, P13, P15, P18, P19, P20, P23, P24, P26.

[11] P23, P24.

[12] P4.

[13] P4.

[14] P2, P4, P13, P26.

[15] Chris Creed and others, ‘Inclusive AR/VR: Accessibility Barriers for Immersive Technologies’ (2024) 23 Universal Access in the Information Society 59.

[16] P3, P9, P14.

[17] P10.

[18] P24.

[19] P1, P2, P6, P7, P8, P9, P10, P13, P15, P17, P19, P21, P22, P23, P25.

[20] P18.

[21] ‘What are immersive technologies?’ <www.adalovelaceinstitute.org/resource/immersive-technologies-explainer/> accessed 17 June 2025.

[22] ‘Introducing Apple Vision Pro: Apple’s First Spatial Computer’ (Apple Newsroom, 5 June 2023) <https://www.apple.com/uk/newsroom/2023/06/introducing-apple-vision-pro/> accessed 16 December 2024.

[23] ‘How Immersive Technologies Are Changing the Face of Construction, Education, and Beyond’ (Meta blog, 29 November 2023) <https://www.meta.com/blog/quest/immersive-technologies-vr-mr-metaverse-construction-education-entrepreneurs> accessed 28 January 2025.

[24] Boyan Jovanovic and Peter L Rousseau, ‘Chapter 18 – General Purpose Technologies’ in Philippe Aghion and Steven N Durlauf (eds), Handbook of Economic Growth, vol 1 (Elsevier 2005) <https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S157406840501018X> accessed 28 March 2025.

[25] ‘Immersive Technology Will Revolutionize Everything from Theme Parks to Daily Life’ (Big Think: The Future, 22 July 2021) <https://bigthink.com/the-future/immersive-technology/> accessed 8 January 2025.

[26] Gary Sangha, ‘Council Post: Navigating the Generative AI Hype Cycle’ (Forbes, 2023) <https://www.forbes.com/councils/forbestechcouncil/2023/09/01/navigating-the-generative-ai-hype-cycle/> accessed 28 January 2025.

[27] Andrew Williams, ‘Meta Quest 3S Data Is A Warning Of The Future For VR Fans’ (Forbes, 1 September 2025) <https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewwilliams/2025/01/17/meta-quest-3s-data-is-a-warning-of-the-future-for-vr-fans/> accessed 26 March 2025.

[28] Meta Quest 3S Failed to Boost Holiday Demand for VR in 2024’ (Game Developer, 15 January 2025) <https://www.gamedeveloper.com/business/meta-quest-3s-failed-to-boost-holiday-demand-for-vr-in-2024> accessed 26 March 2025.

[29] ‘Mark Zuckerberg’s Metaverse Project Dies after 18 Months’ (New Statesman, 31 May 2025) <https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/social-media/2023/05/death-metaverse-mark-zuckerberg-facebook> accessed 13 May 2025; John Naughton, ‘A Moment’s Silence, Please, for the Death of Mark Zuckerberg’s Metaverse’ The Guardian (13 May 2023) <https://www.theguardian.com/technology/commentisfree/2023/may/13/death-of-mark-zuckerberg-metaverse-meta-facebook-virtual-reality-ai> accessed 13 May 2025.

[30] Salvador Rodriguez, ‘Meta Welcomes Headset War With Apple’ (WSJ, 28 January 2024) <https://www.wsj.com/tech/personal-tech/meta-facebook-vr-quest-war-apple-1a09ae0b> accessed 31 March 2025.

[31] ‘History Of Virtual Reality’ (Virtual Reality Society) <https://www.vrs.org.uk/virtual-reality/history.html> accessed 12 June 2025.

[32] Noah Wardrip-Fruin and Nick Montfort, The New Media Reader (MIT Press, 2003).

[33] Lev Manovich, ‘The Language of New Media’ (2002) 27 Canadian Journal of Communication <https://cjc.utppublishing.com/doi/full/10.22230/cjc.2002v27n1a1280> accessed 24 June 2025.

[34] ‘InnovationQTM Powered by IP.Com Prior Art Database’ (IBM TDB Archive) <https://priorart.ip.com/IPCOM/000040923> accessed 12 June 2025.

[35] ‘History Of Virtual Reality’ (Virtual Reality Society) <https://www.vrs.org.uk/virtual-reality/history.html> accessed 12 June 2025.

[36] ‘Magic Leap 1: Full Specification’ (VRcompare) <https://vr-compare.com/headset/magicleap1> accessed 15 May 2025.

[37] ‘Oculus Rift: Step Into the Game’ (Kickstarter, 30 January 2016) <https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1523379957/oculus-rift-step-into-the-game> accessed 8 January 2025.

[38] ‘Virtual Reality in China – The New Action Plan for Metaverse Technology’ (China Briefing News, 14 November 2022) <https://www.china-briefing.com/news/virtual-reality-in-china-new-action-plan-for-developing-industry/> accessed 13 May 2025.

[39] ‘China Metaverse Action Plan: Three-Year National Development Strategy’ (China Briefing News, 25 September 2023) <https://www.china-briefing.com/news/china-releases-three-year-action-plan-for-metaverse-industry-development/> accessed 13 May 2025.

[40] P24; ‘Immersive Technologies of J. Val Del Omar’s Media Art (“apanoramic image overflow”, “diaphony”, “tactile vision”) as an Expression of his Concept of “Mechanical Mysticism”’ (2021) <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/351197603_immersive_technologies_of_j_val_del_omar’s_media_art_apanoramic_image_overflow_diaphony_tactile_vision_as_an_expression_of_his_concept_of_mechanical_mysticism> accessed 22 November 2024.

[41] P12, P23, P25, P26.

[42] Anthony Marshall and Christian Bieck, ‘Metaverse: The Post-Hype Future’ (2024) 52 Strategy &amp; Leadership 17.

[43] Michael R Heim, ‘Chapter 13 – Virtual Reality Wave 3’ in Jayne Gackenbach and Johnathan Bown (eds), Boundaries of Self and Reality Online (Academic Press 2017) 3 <https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B978012804157400013X> accessed 8 January 2025.

[44] P12.

[45] P21.

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[50] P20.

[51] P21.

[52] P24.

[53] P2, P13, P20.

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[55] P1, P20.

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[57] Frank Biocca, ‘Virtual Reality Technology: A Tutorial’ (1992) 42 Journal of Communication 23.

[58] P24.

[59] ‘Nintendo’s Wii Launch Goes Smoothly’ (NBC News, 19 November 2006) <https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna15802977> accessed 8 January 2025.

[60] P5.

[61] P20.

[62] Dale Southerton, ‘Second Life’ [2011] Encyclopedia of Consumer Culture.

[63] Siddhesh Manjrekar and others, ‘CAVE: An Emerging Immersive Technology – A Review’, 2014 UKSim-AMSS 16th International Conference on Computer Modelling and Simulation (IEEE 2014) <http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7046051/> accessed 6 September 2024.

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[65] P4.

[66] Verge Staff, ‘From Kickstarter to Facebook: The Full Oculus Rift Story’ (The Verge, 11 January 2013) <https://www.theverge.com/2013/1/11/3867146/oculus-rift> accessed 8 January 2025.

[67] P12, P22, P23, P24, P25, P26.

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[69] P22, P23, P24.

[70] P12; Rafael Motamayor, ‘Why Meta Discontinued the Oculus Rift’ (MSN) <https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/why-meta-discontinued-the-oculus-rift/ar-BB1pV1bQ?ocid=BingNewsVerp> accessed 8 January 2025.

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[73] P9, P25.

[74] P9.

[75] P9, P20, P25.

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[80] Leighton Evans, The Re-Emergence of Virtual Reality (Routledge 2018).

[81] P12.

[83] P9.

[84] P5.

[85] Jonas Schjerlund, Magnus Rotvit Perlt Hansen and Josefine Gill Jensen, ‘Design Principles for Room-Scale Virtual Reality: A Design Experiment in Three Dimensions’ in Samir Chatterjee, Kaushik Dutta and Rangaraja P Sundarraj (eds), Designing for a Digital and Globalized World (Springer International Publishing 2018).

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[96] P7.

[97] James Vincent, ‘Microsoft’s AR Glasses Aren’t Cutting It with US Soldiers, Says Leaked Report’ (The Verge, 13 October 2022) <https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/13/23402195/microsoft-us-army-hololens-ar-goggles-internal-reports-failings-nausea-headaches> accessed 17 September 2024.

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[101] P10, P24.

[102] P4, P23.

[103] P23.

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[107] P5.

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[109] P25.

[110] P6, P20, P22, P23, P25, P26.

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[112] P12, P15.

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[127] P8, P9.

[128] P2, P8, P9, P15, P19 P25.

[129] P9, P19, P25.

[130] P9.

[131] P19.

[132] Boyan Jovanovic and Peter L Rousseau, ‘General Purpose Technologies’ in Philippe Aghion and Steven N Durlauf (eds), Handbook of Economic Growth, vol 1 (Elsevier 2005) 18 <https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S157406840501018X> accessed 21 May 2025.

[133] P1, P5, P6, P12, P13, P19, P24.

[134] P4.

[135] P24.

[136] P2.

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[139] P23.

[140] P19.

[141] P2, P5, P24, P25, P26.

[142] P19.

[143] P5, P19, P25.

[144] P1, P12, P25.

[145] Dean Takahashi, ‘With $590M in More Funding, Magic Leap Looks to the Future: Interview’ (VentureBeat, 16 January 2024) <https://venturebeat.com/games/with-590m-in-more-funding-magic-leap-loosk-to-the-future-interview/> accessed 23 January 2025.

[146] P9.

[147] P13.

[148] P1, P10, P14, P15.

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[153] P2, P10, P8, P6. P14, P19, P21, P23, P26.

[154] P4, P12, P23, P25, P26.

[155] P4.

[156] P1, P2, P9, P12, P19, P21, P23, P25, P26.

[157] P2, P10, P8, P6. P14, P19, P21, P23, P26.

[158] P21.

[159] Anthony Marshall and Christian Bieck, ‘Metaverse: The Post–Hype Future’ (2024) 52 Strategy &amp; Leadership 17.

[160] P1, P15, P19, P21, P24, P25, P26.

[161] P23.

[162] P6, P20, P22, P23, P25, P26.

[163] P2.

[164] Ofcom, ‘Online Nation 2021 Report’ (2021) <https://www.ofcom.org.uk/research-and-data/internet-and-on-demand-research/online-nation> accessed 10 April 2022.

[165] Charlie Halford and others, ‘Immersive Technologies and the Metaverse: Recommendations and Overview’ (Research & Development White Paper WHP 407, BBC, 2023).

[166] P10.

[167] P18.

[168] P1, P2, P9, P12, P19, P21. P23, P25, P26.

[169] P2.

[170] Ajay Sudhir Bale and others, ‘Augmenting Knowledge Management with Immersive Technologies: Exploring Transformative Use Cases for AR and VR’, 2024 International Conference on Advances in Computing, Communication and Applied Informatics (ACCAI) (2024) <https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/10602348> accessed 16 January 2025.

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[173] Nane Winkler, ‘Breaking Barriers: The Path to Immersive Technologies Adoption in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises’ [2024] Wirtschaftsinformatik 2024 Proceedings <https://aisel.aisnet.org/wi2024/11>.

[174] P9.

[175] Charlie Halford and others, ‘Immersive Technologies and the Metaverse: Recommendations and Overview’ <https://downloads.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/whp/whp-pdf-files/WHP407.pdf> accessed 24 January 2025

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[177] ‘DRCF Immersive Technologies Foresight Paper’ <https://www.drcf.org.uk/publications/papers/immersive-technologies-foresight-paper> accessed 9 February 2024.

[178] P2, P8, P9, P10, P20, P22.

[179] P9, P10.

[180] P10.

[181] Christine M Baker, ‘Immersive Technologies: Benefits, Challenges, and Predicted Trends’ (Strategic Nudge Ltd 2002) <https://services.igi-global.com/resolvedoi/resolve.aspx?doi=10.4018/978-1-7998-7712-7.ch003> accessed 16 January 2025.

[182] P9.

[183] P9.

[184] P2, P7, P9, P15, P17, P25.

[185] P17.

[186] P2, P7, P9, P12, P15, P17, P22.

[187] Héctor Martínez and others, ‘Drivers and Bottlenecks in the Adoption of Augmented Reality Applications’ (2014) 2 Journal of Multimedia Theory and Applications 27.

[188] P23.

[189] Anthony Marshall and Christian Bieck, ‘Metaverse: The Post–Hype Future’ (2024) 52 Strategy &amp; Leadership 17

[190] P9, P10, P13, P14, P18, P19, P21, P23, P26.

[191] P18.

[192] P23.

[193] P7, P9, P10, P14, P23.

[194] P10.

[195] P9, P10, P13, P14, P17, P18, P23, P26.

[196] P9.

[197] P10.

[198] P14.

[199] P10.

[200] P26.

[201] P13, P23.

[202] Aliviya Kurniya Rachmawati, Heryanto and Hengki Tornando, ‘Challenges in Consumer Adaptation to Immersive Technologies: A Comprehensive Literature Review’ (2024) 7 eCo-Buss 317.

[203] P13.

[204] Becky Spittle and others, ‘A Review of Interaction Techniques for Immersive Environments’ (2023) 29 IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 3900.

[205] P13.

[206] P2, P7, P15.

[207] P2.

[208] Celine Merkx and Jeroen Nawijn, ‘Virtual Reality Tourism Experiences: Addiction and Isolation’ (2021) 87 Tourism Management 104394.

[209] P1, P4, P7, P9, P10, P15, P19, P20, P22.

[210] P19.

[211] P4.

[212] P10.

[213] Linda Ryan Bengtsson and Elizabeth Van Couvering, ‘Stretching Immersion in Virtual Reality: How Glitches Reveal Aspects of Presence, Interactivity and Plausibility’ (2023) 29 Convergence 432.

[214] P10.

[215] P10.

[216] P2, P10, P24.

[217] P2, P4, P7, P9, P13, P15, P18, P19, P20, P23, P24, P26.

[218] P9.

[219] P2, P7, P9, P13, P15, P23, P24, P26.

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[221] P2.

[222] P13, P15, P24, P26.

[223] P26.

[224] P26.

[225] P26, P24.

[226] P24.

[227] P7.

[228] P7.

[229] P23, P24.

[230] Jia-Wei Lin and others, ‘Visualizing the Keyboard in Virtual Reality for Enhancing Immersive Experience’ (ACM SIGGRAPH 2017 Posters, Association for Computing Machinery 2017) <https://doi.org/10.1145/3102163.3102175> accessed 16 January 2025.

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[232] P3, P6.

[233] P6.

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[235] P4.

[236] P4.

[237] P2, P4, P13, P26.

[238] Simone Grassini and Karin Laumann, ‘Immersive Visual Technologies and Human Health’, Proceedings of the 32nd European Conference on Cognitive Ergonomics (Association for Computing Machinery 2021) <https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3452853.3452856> accessed 16 January 2025.

[239] P2.

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[241] P4, P9, P23.

[242] P3.

[243] P14.

[244] P9.

[245] Chris Creed and others, ‘Inclusive AR/VR: Accessibility Barriers for Immersive Technologies’ (2023) Universal Access in the Information Society <https://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10209-023-00969-0> accessed 25 October 2023.

[246] P10.

[247] P24.

[248] P1, P2, P6, P7, P8, P9, P10, P13, P15, P17, P19, P21, P22, P23, P25.

[249] P1, P2, P18.

[250] P2.

[251] P2.

[252] P8, P15.

[253] P18, P19.

[254] P25.

[255] P9, P20, p25.

[256] P9, P26.

[257] P9.

[258] Joanna Glasner, ‘Startup Investors Have Fled The Metaverse’ (Crunchbase News, 16 January 2024) <https://news.crunchbase.com/venture/startup-investors-metaverse-funding-falls-aapl/> accessed 1 July 2025; Joanna Glasner, ‘Metaverse And Augmented Reality Remain Unpopular With VCs’ (Crunchbase News, 21 June 2024) <https://news.crunchbase.com/venture/metaverse-ar-vr-ai-aapl-meta/> accessed 15 May 2025.

[259] P18

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[277] P18.

[278] Isak de Villiers Bosman and others, ‘Immersive Technology in Education’ (2024) 61 Proceedings of the Association for Information Science and Technology 721.

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[577] P9.

[578] ‘Future of Augmented Reality: A Comprehensive Study on Apple Vision Pro.’ (EBSCO) <https://openurl.ebsco.com/EPDB%3Agcd%3A3%3A5927139/detailv2?sid=ebsco%3Aplink%3Ascholar&id=ebsco%3Agcd%3A179699113&crl=c&link_origin=scholar.google.com> accessed 17 January 2025.

[579] P12.

[580] ‘Invest 2035: The UK’s Modern Industrial Strategy’ (Department for Business and Trade, 24 November 2024) <https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/invest-2035-the-uks-modern-industrial-strategy/invest-2035-the-uks-modern-industrial-strategy> accessed 28 April 2025.

[581] ‘AI Opportunities Action Plan’ (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, 13 January 2025) <https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ai-opportunities-action-plan/ai-opportunities-action-plan> accessed 31 March 2025.

[582] P6.

[583] P2.

[584] P6.

[585] ‘PatBase: Leading Patent Search and Analysis Technology’ (Minesoft) <https://minesoft.com/solutions/patent-intelligence/patbase/> accessed 24 January 2025.

[586] P4.

[587] P7, P12, P23.

[588] P2, P5, P12, P25, P26.

[589] P5, P12, P14, P26.

[590] P14.

[591] P14.

[592] P6, P14, P24.

[593] P5, P7, P8, P12, P14, P23, P25.

[594]P1, P2, P4, P5, P6, P7, P8, P9, P11, P12, P13, P14, P15, P20, P21, P22, P23, P24, P25, P26.

[595] P5, P14.

[596] P2, P26.

[597] P1, P2, P4, P5, P6, P7, P12, P13, P14, P19, P23, P25.

[598] P14.

[599] P14, P20, P26.

[600] P14.

[601] P2, P5, P8, P10, P12, P14, P13, P15, P21, P23, P24, P25, P26.

[602] P9, P14, P26.

[603] P14.

[604] P5, P13, P14, P15, P24, P25, P26.

[605] P1, P6, P8, P12, P15, P23, P26.

[606] P1, P2, P4, P5, P6, P7, P8, P9, P11, P12, P13, P14, P17, P29, P20 P21, P22, P24, P25, P26.

[607] P2, P4, P6, P8, P10, P12, P15, P21, P22, P24, P25.

[608] P15.

[609] P5, P6, P8, P14, P25.

[610] P4, P13, P25, P26.

[611] P6, P8, P12, P13, P14, P20, P25.